Platelet Membrane Studies in the May-Hegglin Anomaly

Since studies of the giant platelets in the Bernard-Soulier syndrome have shown decreased electrophoretic mobility, decreased sialic acid, and an abnormality in a membrane glycoprotein, we performed similar studies on the giant platelets from two patients with the May-Hegglin anomaly. The patients’ platelet electrophoretic mobilities did not differ from control. Although the total sialic acid contents of the patients’ platelets were greater than control when calculated per platelet, they were very similar to control when normalized for differences in platelet volume and surface area. When platelet proteins were separated by sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, there were no differences between the glycoproteins of control and patient platelets as judged by the patterns of periodic acid Schiff staining and fluorescein-labeled concanavalin A binding. Similarly, patterns of surface glycoprotein labeling by neuraminidase/galactose oxidase/KB3M4 were identical. We conclude that unlike the giant platelets in the Bernard-Soulier syndrome, those of the May-Hegglin anomaly are not associated with a membrane abnormality detectable by these techniques.