Monday, September 26, 2016

Dual aspirin and anticoagulant therapy in patients with atrial fibrillation.

In patients with non-valvular atrial fibrillation, there appears to be no or little benefit of aspirin therapy in addition to coumadin therapy. Dual antiplatelet and anticoagulant therapy increases major bleeding risk. J Thromb Thrombolysis. 2016 Sep 24;

Comment: There may be a role for dual antiplatelet / anticoagulant therapy in patients with non-valvular atrial fibrillation who are within 12 months of acute coronary syndrome or revascularization. However, with these exclusions in place, the researchers still found that 45% of the patients in their retrospective review were receiving both an anticoagulant and aspirin.