Travelling to High Altitudes Could be Thrombogenetic!

People ascending to high altitude regions are at risk for a variety of health problems, commonly including acute mountain sickness (AMS), high-altitude cerebral oedema (HACE) and high-altitude pulmonary oedema (HAPE) etc. Increasing travel to mountainous terrains has brought light to several other medical problems as well. It has been well recognized that a hypercoagulable state exists when a person is exposed to high altitude environment. This may manifest as early thromboembolic episodes, which may result in deep vein thrombosis (DVT) or acute pulmonary embolism (PE), which is a potentially fatal condition. The various effects of thrombosis include pulmonary thrombo-embolism (PTE), cerebral venous thrombosis, portal/splenic vein thrombosis, and deep vein thrombosis (DVT). Out of all these conditions, PTE is an extremely common and highly lethal condition that is a leading cause of death in all age groups. Exposure to high altitude (HA), either during air travels, ascension of mountains, or while engaging in sports activities results in hyper coagulability thus predisposing to thromboembolic events. Climbers staying at high altitudes for weeks also possess several risk factors for thromboembolism. A large number of environmental variables suggest that a single cause of HA-induced thromboembolic disorders (TED) may not exist, so that this peculiar phenomenon could be seen as a complex or multifactorial trait. In view of the greatly increased risk of getting deep venous thrombosis and pulmonary embolism at high altitude, it would be interesting to review the studies done so far for defining its cause and treatment. Thus the present review examines the risk of thrombosis at increasing elevations along with the possible underlying mechanisms, the diagnosis and treatment strategies.