Question

A hereditary disease of the platelets would result in which of the following?



Excessive bleeding that will also be prevalent in other family members
Excessive bleeding that will not be prevalent in other family members
Fatigue and exhaustion that will also be prevalent in other family members
Fatigue and exhaustion that will not be prevalent in other family members

help

Answer 1

This is a lousy question. All the answers are realistic biologic possibilities.

Platelets help blood clot. So the patient will show abnormalities in blood clotting. Some hereditary diseases like hemophilia involve loss of platelet function, that patient would bleed more. Some other hereditary states involving gain-of-function mutations in clotting factors or loss of function in fibrolytic (i.e., anti-clotting) pathways predispose the person to too much clotting. Which is as bad as bleeding too much. Disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) and pulmonary embolisms have killed a lot of people too. Just not on Game of Thrones.

Anyone without enough platelets to properly clot will bleed too much. They will lose a lot of red cells and their blood's ability to transport oxygen will be inhibited, so they will be fatigued and exhausted all the time too.

Also, you don't have enough info to tell whether their relatives will or will not be affected. It depends on how that particular gene that causes it manifests itself phenotypicaly. If the gene is codominant, the family members won't have the full blown medical condition - but they will have a half-way phenotype that looks a little like the full disease, but milder.

Lousy question, they're all viable possibilities, and without more info it's impossible to say.