Hemophilia Carriers

Abstract

Hemophilia carriers have long been considered clinically asymptomatic in terms of bleeding symptoms; however more recent investigations have demonstrated that despite an inability to identify these women based on factor activity alone, due to many of them demonstrating normal values, these women do in fact have a bleeding phenotype. Predominant symptoms in this population are seen in the setting of increased bleeding risk, such as after surgical or dental procedures or heavy menstrual bleeding; however clinical and subclinical joint bleeding is also a concern. Over the last few decades, these women are coming to the attention of medical providers and researchers; however numerous pathologic and clinical questions remain.