Thrombelastography and tromboelastometry in assessing coagulopathy in trauma

Death due to trauma is the leading cause of lost life years worldwide, with haemorrhage being responsible for 30-40% of trauma mortality and accounting for almost 50% of the deaths the initial 24 h. On admission, 25-35% of trauma patients present with coagulopathy, which is associated with a several-fold increase in morbidity and mortality. The recent introduction of haemostatic control resuscitation along with emerging understanding of acute post-traumatic coagulability, are important means to improve therapy and outcome in exsanguinating trauma patients. This change in therapy has emphasized the urgent need for adequate haemostatic assays to monitor traumatic coagulopathy and guide therapy. Based on the cell-based model of haemostasis, there is emerging consensus that plasma-based routine coagulation tests (RCoT), like prothrombin time (PT) and activated partial thromboplastin time (APTT), are inappropriate for monitoring coagulopathy and guide therapy in trauma. The necessity to analyze whole blood to accurately identify relevant coagulopathies, has led to a revival of the interest in viscoelastic haemostatic assays (VHA) such as Thromboelastography (TEG^®) and Rotation Thromboelastometry (ROTEM^®). Clinical studies including about 5000 surgical and/or trauma patients have reported on the benefit of using the VHA as compared to plasma-based assays, to identify coagulopathy and guide therapy.

This article reviews the basic principles of VHA, the correlation between the VHA whole blood clot formation in accordance with the cell-based model of haemostasis, the current use of VHA-guided therapy in trauma and massive transfusion (haemostatic control resuscitation), limitations of VHA and future perspectives of this assay in trauma.