Affiliations: Department of Internal Medicine, Kantonsspital, CH 7000 Chur, Switzerland | AO Research Institute, CH 7270 Davos, Switzerland | Institute of Radiology, Kantonsspital, CH 7000 Chur, Switzerland
Abstract: The influence of contrast media on blood viscosity, erythrocyte morphology and platelet function was studied. In vitro blood was incubated with iopromide (Ultravist®), ioxaglate (Hexabrix®) or gadolinium‐DOTA (Dotarem®). Plasma viscosity and whole blood viscosity were measured and the mean erythrocyte volume and morphology were assessed. Platelet aggregation was measured with a PFA‐100® instrument. In an ex vivo study on patients receiving these contrast media the same measurements as described above were done. All contrast media increased blood viscosity at high shear rate in a dose dependent manner (e.g. with ioxaglate: from 4.9±0.2 mPa.s to 8.6±0.5 mPa.s at 160 mg I/ml), decreased low shear viscosity (for ioxaglate: from 44.9±2.5 to 27.7±4.8 mPa.s), increased plasma viscosity (ioxaglate: from 1.2±0.1 to 2.8±1.3 mPa.s), decreased the mean erythrocytic volume (ioxaglate: from 89.7±1.4 to 79.7±2.0 fl) and decreased platelet aggregation. Iopromide induced an echinocytic shape transformation of erythrocytes. Ex vivo a decreased hematocrit and a consecutively decreased whole blood viscosity were found with iopromide and ioxaglate. We conclude that contrast media influenced blood rheology, erythrocytes and platelet aggregation in vitro and ex vivo.
