Cardiology Letters 2021, 30(3):168-174

COVID-19 vaccination and thrombosis

Sokol J¹, Nehaj F², Chudej J¹, Lisá L¹

¹ Klinika hematológie a transfúziológie, Jesseniova lekárska fakulta v Martine, Univerzita Komenského v Bratislave

² Oddelenia arytmií a kardiostimulácie, Národný ústav srdcových a cievnych chorôb, a. s., Bratislava, Klinika kardiológie a angiológie, Národný ústav srdcových a cievnych chorôb, a. s. a Lekárská fakulta Slovenskej zdravotníckej univerzity, Bratislava, Slovenská republika

Vaccines against COVID-19 caused by coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 represent a key countermeasure in fighting the current pandemic. From December 2020 to March 2021, the European Medicines Agency approved four vaccines. In late February of 2021, a prothrombotic syndrome was observed in a small group of individuals who received the ChAdOx1 CoV-19 vaccine (AstraZeneca, University of Oxford), an adenoviral vector-based vaccine. Subsequently, similar findings were observed in a small number of subjects who received the Ad26.COV2.S vaccine (Janssen; Johnson & Johnson), also based on an adenoviral vector. This syndrome is currently referred to as vaccine-induced immune thrombotic thrombocytopenia (VITT). In this review, we have summarized the epidemiological characteristics, clinical features, diagnosis, and treatment of this serious syndrome related to SARS-CoV-2 vaccination.

Keywords: COVID-19; vaccination; thrombosis; thrombocytopenia

Published: March 1, 2021  Show citation