Coagulopathies in orthopaedics: links to inflammation and the potential of individualizing treatment strategies.

Orthopaedic patients are at risk for developing pathologic imbalances of coagulation factors characterized by phases of both hypocoagulability and hypercoagulability. Complications from "hypocoagulability" include life-threatening hemorrhage, wound hematoma, and poor wound healing. Complications due to "hypercoagulability" include deep venous thrombosis, pulmonary embolus, and disseminated intravascular coagulation.

The α₂β₁ integrin is a metastasis suppressor in mouse models and human cancer.

Integrins regulate cell-cell and cell-matrix adhesion and thereby play critical roles in tumor progression and metastasis. Although work in preclinical models suggests that β1 integrins may stimulate metastasis of a number of cancers, expression of the β1 subunit alone has not been shown to be a useful prognostic indicator in human cancer patients. Here we have demonstrated that the α2β1 integrin suppresses metastasis in a clinically relevant spontaneous mouse model of breast cancer.

Assays for membrane complement receptors.

Leukocytes express several types of receptors for activated products of the complement (C) system. This unit describes assays for a subset of these receptors: those specific for fixed fragments of C3 (CR1, CR2, CR3, and CR4). Although the assays have been designed for tests of human C receptors, they can often be carried out with rodent (e.

Isolation and purification of C3 from human plasma.

The alternative pathway of complement shares its terminal components (C3 and C5 through 9) with the classical pathway, but has several unique components, including factors D, B, and P (properdin). This unit presents methods for assaying total alternative pathway activity and the activity of factors B and D. Radial immunodiffusion (RID) can also be used to measure factor D, B, and P concentrations.