THROMBOTIC THROMBOPENIC PURPURA

Abstract

In 1925 Eli Moschcowitz 1 called attention to a previously undescribed entity of anemia with widespread hyaline thrombosis of capillaries and terminal arterioles. It was not until 1936, however, that Baehr, Klemperer, and Schifrin 2 described the pathological picture at post-mortem examination and correlated it with a characteristic clinical syndrome. On histological examination numerous small thrombi were found in the arterioles, capillaries, and venules of almost every organ and tissue. This syndrome was invariably associated with all the usual features of thrombopenia, in addition to an acute febrile episode, severe anemia, and neurological manifestations, which differentiated it from the ordinary type of thrombopenic purpura. Baehr and his associates believed that the lack of platelets in the circulating blood might be due to the myriads of platelets caught in the widespread thrombi in the many small vessels throughout the viscera, so that the available supply was exhausted, resulting in thrombopenia of