Summary

Recent changes in quality of transfusion supply, transfusion triggers as well as fluid therapy promote the development of dilutional coagulopathy. Nevertheless, up to now guidelines generally assume presence of hypocoagulability when more than one individual circulating blood volume is lost. This might be true for some patients under some conditions but is not necessarily true for every patient. Routine coagulation tests are insufficient in predicting increased bleeding and, moreover, only available after an unacceptable time delay. Therefore, the occurrence of diffuse microvascular bleeding is often used as clinical sign to start hemostatic therapy. However, such severe derangement of hemostasis might lead to the development of secondary tissue damage and frequently is unresponsive to conventional treatment. Coagulopathy occurring during extensive surgery or after polytrauma can be detected and treated early when using the ROTEM monitoring. Recent data showing a direct beneficial effect of hemostatic therapy on blood loss and final outcome are scarce. However, evidence exists that the amount of blood loss, the presence of coagulopathy, and the number of transfusions needed are associated with poor outcome in bleeding patients. Although manifold articles have been published already using thrombelastography for various indications (MEDLINE research 'thrombelastography', 2,022 articles), further data are needed to confirm the clinical experience that this technique is an excellent tool for safe patient management.

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