RiaSTAP vs. Conventional Transfusion in Patients Having Heart Valve Surgery

Study Summary

Heart surgery involving valve replacement often involves the use of the heart-lung machine for over 90 minutes, and bleeding tendency is frequently seen. Conventionally, platelet transfusion has been the primary therapy to treat bleeding after this type of procedure. More recently, perioperative supplementation of purified fibrinogen (RiaSTAP, CSL Behring) was shown to reduce bleeding and blood product use (plasma or platelets) after heart surgery. The objective of this trial is to demonstrate the clinical equivalency and economic utility of using fibrinogen concentrate, RiaSTAP for the mitigation of post-operative bleeding in patients in lieu of platelet transfusion. Purified fibrinogen concentrate has been approved by FDA, and it has been used for the treatment of acute bleeding episodes in patients with low fibrinogen due to hereditary causes (e.g., afibrinogenemia). Compared to the transfusion of platelets which may be associated with volume overload, bacterial/viral infection, immunological effects and excess blood clotting, purified fibrinogen has several advantages. First, it contains no liquid plasma allowing for low volume infusion. Several viral inactivation/reduction steps are used to prepare the fibrinogen concentrate, increasing its viral safety. No antibodies or white blood cells are contained in the fibrinogen concentrate; therefore transfusion reactions are rare. Although platelet transfusion is widely used after heart surgery, there has been no randomized study to endorse this practice. In this study, patients undergoing heart valve replacement will be randomized to receive either platelet (1 unit) transfusion or fibrinogen concentrate (4g) after heparin anticoagulation is reversed. Subjects will be treated only if there is evidence of significant microvascular bleeding. Fifteen minutes after the initial treatment, subjects will be reevaluated for bleeding. If bleeding continues, subjects will be treated with blood transfusion per institutional sta

Primary Outcome

Bleeding scores are scored on a four-point scale. A visual assessment of surgical field was performed by the senior surgical staff as follows: 0 = excellent hemostasis (dry field), 1 = mild bleeding (oozing), 2 = moderate bleeding (controllable with applied pressure), and 3 = severe bleeding (multiple diffuse bleeding sites). If the visual bleeding scale was 2 to 3, the subjects were randomly assigned to a study intervention using a closed envelope method.

Interventions

• DRUG Human fibrinogen concentrate
• OTHER apheresis platelets