Antifibrinolytic therapy in genitourinary tract surgery.

Severe generalised haemorrhage associated with plasma proteolytic activity after thoracic surgery, operations for hyperplasia or carcinoma of the prostate, gastrointestinal or pancreatic resection, and other operations was reported in the early 1950s.1-3 Such plasma proteolytic activity is usually part of a disseminated intravascular coagulation syndrome. Sometimes, however, the local fibrinolytic activity in the area of the operation or trauma disturbs haemostasis and wound healing. This activity is not usually pathological but is a physiological one in different tissues and body fluids.