Role of factor V Leiden and prothrombin 20210A in patients with retinal artery occlusion.

PURPOSE: Retinal artery occlusion is a common vision-threatening disease. Among other risk factors, coagulopathies leading to a hypercoagulable state have been associated with retinal artery occlusion. Numerous studies have shown that two genetic variants, factor V Leiden and prothrombin 20210A, cause a procoagulant state. However, their role in the pathogenesis of retinal artery occlusion is still unclear. The purpose of the present study was therefore to investigate a possible association between factor V Leiden, prothrombin 20210A, and retinal artery occlusion. METHODS: In the present retrospective case-control study, we studied 136 patients with retinal artery occlusion and 136 age- and gender-matched control subjects. The presence of factor V Leiden and prothrombin 20210A alleles was determined by polymerase chain reaction. RESULTS: The prevalence of heterozygosity for the prothrombin G20210A variant did not significantly differ between patients and controls (three patients vs two controls, P=0.65). Distribution of factor V Leiden genotypes revealed no significant difference among the two groups (heterozygosity: eight patients vs 11 controls, P=0.47). As for other risk factors, arterial hypertension, a history of stroke and myocardial infarction were significantly more frequent in patients than in controls. CONCLUSION: Our data suggest that factor V Leiden and prothrombin 20210A do not play a major role in patients with retinal artery occlusion.

The impact of diets with different magnesium contents on magnesium and calcium in serum and tissues of the rat.

The impact of three different magnesium diets (70, 1,000 and 9,000 ppm) on total, ionized and bound magnesium as well as ionized calcium in serum and total calcium and magnesium in femoral bone, skeletal muscle, heart and liver of male Sprague-Dawley rats was investigated. The percentage of ionized serum magnesium was unproportionally high in rats fed a low magnesium (70 ppm) diet. Femoral magnesium was correlated with ionized and total serum magnesium. In contrast, there was generally no correlation between total serum magnesium and the magnesium fractions in skeletal muscle, heart and liver. In rats fed the magnesium deficient diet, total cardiac concentration of magnesium was even significantly increased along with total calcium content, while there were no effects on total muscle and liver magnesium. Within the single groups, ionized serum calcium was never proportional to dietary magnesium, but in all three magnesium diet groups together, it was inversely correlated with dietary magnesium. Moreover, ionized serum calcium was inversely correlated with both ionized and total serum magnesium. In all 3 groups together, the concentrations of total calcium and magnesium in heart and skeletal muscle were correlated, within the single groups correlation existed only in the 1000 ppm group. Magnesium influx via calcium channels during low magnesium intake has been seen in non cardiac tissues [35,36], but nothing similar is known about non selective channels for divalent cations in the heart [33]. Thus, magnesium uptake by cardiac cells along with calcium seems to be possible, especially at low intracellular magnesium concentrations, but is still poorly investigated. We suggest that the calcium-antagonistic effect of magnesium is related to the turnover rate of magnesium rather than to its tissue concentrations.