Associations of factor VIIIc,D‐dimer,and plasmin–antiplasmin with incident cardiovascular disease and all‐cause mortality

To examine the associations of three understudied hemostatic factors—D‐dimer, factor VIII_c, and plasmin‐antiplasmin (PAP) complex—with incident cardiovascular disease (CVD) and all cause mortality in the Multiethnic Study of Atherosclerosis cohort. Hemostatic factors were measured at baseline in 45–84‐year‐old patients (n = 6,391) who were free of clinically recognized CVD. Over 4.6 years of follow‐up, we identified 307 CVD events, 207 hard coronary heart disease events, and 210 deaths. D‐dimer, factor VIII_c, and PAP were not associated with CVD incidence after adjustment for other risk factors. In contrast, each factor was associated positively with total mortality, and D‐dimer and factor VIII_c were associated positively with cancer mortality. When modeled as ordinal variables and adjusted for risk factors, total mortality was greater by 33% (95% CI 15–54) for each quartile increment of D‐dimer, 26% (11–44) for factor VIIIc, and 20% (4–38) for PAP. This prospective cohort study did not find D‐dimer, factor VIII_c, or PAP to be risk factors for CVD. Instead, elevated levels of these three hemostatic factors were associated independently with increased risk of death. Elevated D‐dimer and factor VIII_c were associated with increased cancer death. Am. J. Hematol., 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.