Summary«Latent»coagulation guarantees normal equilibrium between cellular and plasma clotting factors. In several experimental and clinical conditions, however, enhanced intravascular clotting (hypercoagulability) occurs lending to a consumption of clotting factors with resulting hypocoagulability and bleeding tendency. This syndrome was characterized as«Verbrauchskoagulopathie»(consumptive coagulopathy). The Sanarelli-Shwartzman phenomenon of the rabbit was used as experimental model for the studies of intravascular coagulation. The pathophysiology of its equivalents in human pathology is discussed.