The most obvious hemostatic vascular reaction is constriction of the blood vessel after injury. This is important in large arteries because platelet adhesion and clotting are insufficient to arrest bleeding. Delayed surgical aid notwithstanding, the survival of some persons who have lost limbs in accidents is due to constriction of their main arteries. Other vascular reactions to injury have only a subsidiary hemostatic effect.

Platelets and their aggregation

Mammalian platelets are nonnucleate cells produced by large bone marrow cells called megakaryocytes and circulate in the blood in a resting, inactive form for an average of 10 days. The normal platelet count in humans is between 150,000 and 400,000 platelets per cubic millimetre of blood. The inactive platelet contains three types of internal granules: the alpha granules, the dense granules, and the lysosomes. Each of these granules is rich in certain chemicals that have an important role in platelet function. For example, dense granules contain large quantities of calcium ions and adenosine diphosphate (ADP). Upon release from the platelet, ADP stimulates other platelets to activate when it binds to the ADP receptor on the platelet membrane. The alpha granules contain many proteins, including fibrinogen, thrombospondin, fibronectin, and von Willebrand factor. Upon platelet activation, platelets alter their shape from discoid to spherical and extend long footlike projections called pseudopodia. The alpha granules and dense granules move to the surface of the platelet, fuse with the platelet membrane, and release their contents into the blood surrounding the platelet. The lysosomes contain enzymes that digest spent proteins and other metabolites of the cell.

Activated platelets strongly adhere to surfaces other than the lining of blood vessels, such as collagen, glass, metals, and fabrics. Adherent platelets themselves become adhesive for other activated platelets so that, in a flow system, a platelet plug develops. The propagation of this adhesiveness from one layer to the next is probably due to chemicals, such as ADP and thromboxane A₂, secreted into the blood from the granules of the activated platelets. The ADP released from the dense granules binds to a receptor on the platelet surface, initiating the biochemical and morphological changes associated with platelet activation and secretion. The property of adhesiveness for normal platelets requires a protein on the surface of the platelet membrane, known as glycoprotein Ib, to bind von Willebrand factor, a large multimeric plasma protein released from the alpha granules. Von Willebrand factor, when bound to glycoprotein Ib on the platelet surface, facilitates the interaction of platelets with a variety of other surfaces (e.g., the damaged vessel lining).

Platelet aggregation is the property of platelets to clump with each other to form a platelet plug. Two proteins on the platelet membrane play an important role in platelet aggregation: glycoprotein IIb and glycoprotein IIIa. These proteins form a complex in the membrane and expose a receptor site after platelet activation that binds fibrinogen (a bivalent molecule with two symmetrical halves that is found in relatively high concentration in plasma). Fibrinogen can bind simultaneously to two platelets. Thus, fibrinogen links platelets together (aggregation) through the glycoprotein IIb–IIIa complex that serves as the fibrinogen receptor.

Injury to the vessel lining and contact of the blood with tissues outside the vessel stimulates thrombin production by the activation of the clotting system. Thrombin causes platelet aggregation. Platelets exposed to thrombin secrete their granules and release the contents of these granules into the surrounding plasma.

Blood coagulation

Coagulation is the replacement of a relatively unstable platelet plug with a stronger, more resilient blood clot through a series of interdependent, enzyme-mediated reactions that bring about the generation of thrombin and the formation of fibrin from fibrinogen. The intrinsic and the extrinsic pathways of coagulation are involved in regulating coagulation; each is activated by a different trigger, although they share many steps in the course of the generation of thrombin.