Cardiovascular comorbidities in antiphospholipid syndrome

Abstract

Antiphospholipid syndrome is an autoimmune disease characterized by venous and/or arterial thrombosis and/or recurrent fetal loss and the presence of antiphospholid antibodies. Among the causes of death of antiphospholipid syndrome there are the myocardial infarction and stroke. Comorbidities could worsen the evolution of these patients, and the knowledge about these situations could prevent or minimizethe risks associated with the disease. In this article, we review the literature about cardiovascular comorbidities, such as traditional risk factors for atherosclerosis, metabolic syndrome and vitamin D deficiency, and how these could influence the prognosis of antiphospholipid syndrome patients.

Keywords::

• antiphospholipid syndrome
• benzathine benzylpenicillin
• cardiovascular
• metabolic syndrome
• prognosis
• vitamin D

Financial & competing interests disclosure

J Freire de Carvalho received research grants from Federico Foundation and CNPq. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.

Key issues

• • Comorbidities could worsen the evolution of antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) patients, and the knowledge about these situations could prevent or minimize the risks associated with the disease.

• • Traditional and non-traditional cardiovascular risk factors could have an important role to the development of thrombosis in APS as well as in the pathogenesis of atherogenesis in this vascular condition.

• • The adequate control of cardiovascular risk factors in APS has been recommended and these factors can be associated with worse prognostic in this disease.

• • Hypovitaminosis D is very frequent in patients with APS and physicians should be aware about this problem.

• • Malignancies with thrombosis may be linked to APS and/or antibodies.