DMD2020-9070

"A Flow Cytometry Method for Characterizing Platelet Activation" DMD2020-9070
Brian Alzua, Mark Smith and Yan Chen, American Preclinical Services

Abstract: Hemocompatibility testing is critical for assessing the safety of blood-contacting medical devices. Comprehensive hemocompatibility testing requires examining a wide range of possible adverse effects cause by direct or indirect blood contact, such as hemolysis, complement activation, and thrombus formation [1]. Moreover, these domains each encompass complex intercellular processes with many potential targets for analysis. For example, the current testing paradigm of platelet function may involve exposing the device to human whole blood and performing simple blood counts and/or macroscopic evaluation to determine the extent of platelet activation and clot formation as described in ASTM F2888-19. However, this approach does not capture any observations for device-mediated initiation of any steps in the platelet activation pathway prior to aggregation. We have validated a method to evaluate platelet activation by quantifying surface p-selectin expression after exposure to various materials. This method will provide an additional level of detail about potential platelet activating properties of a medical device. Flow cytometry has been used previously to measure platelet activation for clinical and research purposes. We sought to adapt this method to test for platelet activation induced by exposure of blood to medical devices or materials. We determined that processing fresh whole blood to platelet-rich plasma (PRP) by gentle centrifugation enhanced the signal compared to fresh blood itself. In each experiment, devices were exposed to PRP according to an extraction ratio of 6 cm2/mL for 1 hour. A blank control consisting of untreated PRP, and a positive control consisting of ADP, a potent agonist, were also used. After the exposure, excess plasma was removed from the articles and combined with anti-CD61 (to stain for platelets) and anti-CD62P (to stain for activated platelets) antibodies. Flow cytometry was then performed to quantify the percentage of CD62P+ over the total CD61+ cells to measure the percentage of activated platelets. In order to optimize the method, we investigated the effect of several experimental factors, including anticoagulant usage, donor variability, and selection of reference materials to serve as controls. Our results indicate that the flow cytometry-based method is consistent and reproducible, quick and easy to perform, and is well-correlated with results from the standard platelet and leukocyte count assay. The flow cytometry-based platelet activation method is a powerful supplement to the standard regimen of medical device hemocompatibility testing.