Viscoelasticity and Red Blood Cell Aggregation in Patients with Coronary Heart Disease

Abstract

Viscoelastic parameters were evaluated in 169 consecutive male pa tients with clinical signs of coronary heart disease. The patients were clas sified according to the extent of coro nary artery stenosis. Levels of blood viscosity, erythrocyte aggregation, and plasma viscosity were elevated in patients with extensive coronary ves sel disease. However, the differences between the several groups were not statistically significant. The increase of hemorheologic parameters was mainly due to high hematocrit, fibrin ogen, and cholesterol concentrations. There was a significant correlation be tween plasma fibrinogen values and plasma viscosity levels. Blood viscos ity and erythrocyte aggregation can be described by multiple linear re gression as a function of the sum of log hematocrit, fibrinogen, choles terol, and α2-macroglobulin.