This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citing articles on ISI (6)  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Related articles  • Similar articles in JAMA  Topic Collections  • Neurology  • Cerebrovascular Disease  • Stroke  • Alert me on articles by topic

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

To the Editor: Dr Levine and colleagues¹ reported that the presence of either LA or aCL did not predict risk for further thrombo-occlusive events among patients with stroke. The authors defined aPL positivity as the presence of LA, aCL, or both. Diagnosis of APS, however, requires aPL positivity to persist over time.² But because the authors only measured this once, some of these results might be false positives or transient increases. We are also concerned that the majority of patients with positive aCL test results had low levels, a finding which is of dubious clinical significance. The relevance of IgA aCL determination is still questionable in any event. Furthermore, the age of the population should be taken into account, as the prevalence of background aCL positivity increases with age.³

The study was powered to detect differences between aPL-positive and aPL-negative subgroups but was not designed to detect differences between patients . . . [Full Text of this Article]

Denis Wahl, MD
d.wahl@chu-nancy.fr
Inserm ERIT-M 0323–UHP Nancy 1
Hémostase CHU de Nancy
Nancy, France

Véronique Regnault, PhD
Inserm ERIT-M 0323–UHP Nancy 1

Philippe de Moerloose, MD
Department of Medicine
University Hospitals
Geneva, Switzerland

Thomas Lecompte, MD
Inserm ERIT-M 0323–UHP Nancy 1
Hémostase CHU de Nancy

RELATED ARTICLES

Antiphospholipid Antibodies and Risk for Recurrent Vascular Events
Antonio R. Cabral
JAMA. 2004;291(22):2701.
EXTRACT | FULL TEXT  

Antiphospholipid Antibodies and Risk for Recurrent Vascular Events
Guillermo Ruiz-Irastorza, Munther A. Khamashta, and Graham R. V. Hughes
JAMA. 2004;291(22):2701.
EXTRACT | FULL TEXT  

Antiphospholipid Antibodies and Risk for Recurrent Vascular Events—Reply
Steven R. Levine, Robin L. Brey, Barbara C. Tilley, Douglas A. Triplett, J. L. P. Thompson, Ralph L. Sacco, J. P. Mohr, and for the APASS Investigators
JAMA. 2004;291(22):2702-2703.
EXTRACT | FULL TEXT  

Antiphospholipid Antibodies and Subsequent Thrombo-occlusive Events in Patients With Ischemic Stroke
APASS Investigators
JAMA. 2004;291(5):576-584.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT