Idiopathic thrombopenic purpura is an autoimmune disease in which the body’s own antibodies destroy blood platelets, resulting in a marked reduction in these types of cells. When this happens, the body has more trouble stopping bleeding, especially from injuries and blows.
Due to the lack of platelets, it is also very common for one of the first symptoms of thrombocytopenic purple to be the frequent appearance of purple spots on the skin in various parts of the body.
- Depending on the total number of platelets and symptoms.
- Your doctor may recommend only greater caution to avoid bleeding or then begin treatment of the disease.
- Which usually includes using medications to decrease the immune system or increase the number of cells in your blood.
The most common symptoms of idiopathic thrombocytopenic purple include:
However, there are also many cases where purple does not cause symptoms, and the person is only diagnosed with the disease because it has less than 10,000 platelets in the blood/mm3.
Most of the time the diagnosis is made by observing symptoms and blood tests, and your doctor tries to eliminate other possible diseases that cause similar symptoms.In addition, it is also very important to evaluate whether medications, such as aspirin, can cause these types of effects.
Idiopathic thromboponic purple occurs when the immune system mistakenly begins to attack the blood’s own platelets, causing a marked decrease in these cells, the exact reason why this occurs is not yet known, and therefore the disease is called idiopathic.
However, some factors appear to increase the risk of developing the disease, such as:
If idiopathic thrombocytopenic purple occurs most often in children, it can occur at any age, even if there are no other cases in the family.
In cases where idiopathic thromboponic purple does not cause symptoms and the amount of platelets is not very low, your doctor may advise only taking care to avoid bumps and sores, as well as performing frequent blood tests to evaluate the number of platelets.
However, in case of symptoms or if the amount of platelets is very low, medications may be recommended:
In addition, people with this type of disease should also avoid using medications that affect the functioning of platelets such as aspirin or ibuprofen, at least without the supervision of a doctor.
In more severe cases, when the disease does not improve with medications indicated by your doctor, surgery may be needed to remove your spleen, which is one of the organs that produces the most antibodies capable of destroying platelets.