Plasma fibrinogen levels in Nigerian homozygous (Hb SS) sickle cell patients.

The plasma fibrinogen levels in 50 Nigerian sickle cell disease (Hb SS) patients in steady state and 50 healthy age and sex-matched (Hb AA) control subjects were determined for the purpose of assessing their baseline values. The fibrinogen levels were assessed using two methods, the clot weight and Clauss, on all the samples for the purpose of comparison. It was observed in this study that the Hb SS patients had significantly higher fibrinogen levels than the healthy Hb AA control subjects, both by the clot weight method (p < 0.001) and the Clauss (p < 0.005). The mean fibrinogen levels (4.1 +/- 2.1 g/L) of the Hb SS patients as determined by the clot weight method, were significantly higher than the values (2.2 +/- 0.3 g/L) obtained by the Clauss method. The mean values for the two methods were 2.8 +/- 0.9 and 2.0 +/- 0.08 g/L, respectively, among the control individuals with a statistically significant difference (p < 0.005). Estimation of the plasma fibrinogen levels in sickle cell disease patients might be a useful indicator of hyper coagulability, while early diagnosis may help to prevent vaso-occlusive crises in these patients.