Post-transfusion purpura: a report of five patients and a review of the pathogenesis and management.

We report five cases of post-transfusion purpura. Despite having profound thrombocytopenia, their management consisted only of steroid administration if serious bleeding was present. In one patient without bleeding, no specific therapy was given. This patient recovered uneventfully. Two patients died. One of these died from complicating illnesses rather than bleeding. The other suffered brain death, the result of a ruptured cerebral aneurysm. Four patients were PLA1 negative. The fifth patient had an antibody to an unidentified platelet-specific antigen.