G.Valet, D.Tschöpe1)
General risk indicators like overweight, smoking, high blood pressure, humoral indicators like altered lipid fractions in the peripheral blood, as well as cellular indicators like monocyte/makrophage lipid receptors indicate the risk for myocardial infarction on a statistical but not on an individual person level.
The appearence of thrombocyte activation antigens like CD62, CD63 or thrombospondin on the thrombocyte surface membrane is the consequence of accelerated blood flow through arteriosclerotically narrowed coronary arteries. Myocardial infarction is ultimately caused by thrombocyte aggregates obstructing such arteries i.e. it seems of interest to determine thrombocyte activation antigen for individual patient risk assessment for myocardial infarction. If successful, a blood test would be substantially easier, with lower risk and less costly than coronary angiography from a cathether.
The average expression of the above antigens on thrombocytes of angiographically verified myocardial infarction risk patients is increased in a statistically significant way. The specificity and sensitivity of the various parameters is, however, too low to identify individual risk patients.
The standardized and automated evaluation of the flow cytometric list mode data files with the CLASSIF1 (2) program provides laboratory and instrument independent triple matrix classifiers from such data (Ann.NY Acad.Sci677,233-251(1993)). They permit a > 95% identification of individual myocardial infarction risk patients from thrombocyte activation antigen measurements. The results underline the potential of the cellular determination such antigens for the detection of risk patients.