Von Willebrand's Disease

Key points

• Von Willebrand's disease is the most common inherited bleeding disorder. The majority of cases are inherited in an autosomal dominant fashion* and characteristically behaves like a platelet disorder i.e.
• large glycoprotein which forms massive multimers up to 1,000,000 Da in size
• promotes platelet adhesion to damaged endothelium
• carrier molecule for factor VIII Types
• type 1: partial reduction in vWF (80% of patients)