Sir.—I was interested to read the report by van de Bor and colleagues1 in the November 1986 issue of AJDC and would like to make several points.
1. The main conclusion van de Bor et al reach is that coagulation disorders are not associated with periventricular-intraventricular hemorrhage (PIVH), yet in their first article2 in the same issue of AJDC, they state that infants who developed PIVH required more plasma transfusions to correct coagulation disorders.
2. No information is given concerning the seven patients who died, one of whom died with grade III and three of whom died with grade IV PIVH. Did these four patients have overwhelming coagulopathy that resulted in death? We are also lacking information on 25% of the study population who had intraventricular hemorrhage.
3. This is a small study in which data on only 40 patients were presented. What certainty do the authors