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PE outcome independent of endothelin levels
2 July 2009
MedWire News: Endothelin is not elevated in patients with pulmonary embolism (PE), say researchers who rule out a role for the vasoconstrictor peptide in pulmonary artery resistance in affected patients.
Research has demonstrated that endothelin is elevated in patients with pulmonary hypertension and is reduced after successful pharmacologic treatment, observe Maciej Kostrubiec (Medical University of Warsaw, Poland) and co-workers.
To determine whether endothelin also plays a role in acute PE, the team measured endothelin levels at hospital admission in 55 patients aged an average of 57 years with a confirmed diagnosis, and 24 healthy individuals of similar age.
As reported in the journal Thrombosis Research, endothelin levels did not significantly differ between PE patients and controls (1.41 vs 1.62 pg/ml).
Nor was there any significant difference in PE patients with and without right ventricular dysfunction on echocardiogram (1.46 vs 1.41 pg/ml), or between patients who died or had another serious event such as cardiopulmonary resuscitation, thrombolysis, or intravenous catecholamine infusion and those who did not (3.19 vs 1.38 pg/ml).
Finally, the team found no significant correlation between levels of endothelin and blood saturation, time from first symptoms, heart rate, blood pressure, and echocardiographic markers.
“We concluded that plasma endothelin concentrations assessed on admission are not elevated in patients with acute PE and it does not play as important role in acute phase of increase of pressure in pulmonary arteries as in chronic pulmonary hypertension,” Kostrubiec et al write.
