Year: 2003
Type: letter
Abstract: Low-Intensity Warfarin Therapy for the Prevention of Recurrent Venous Thromboembolismto the editor: We have two major concerns regarding the report by Ridker et al. on low-intensity warfarin therapy (April 10 issue). 1 First, in this study, low-dose, long-term warfarin therapy resulted in a relative reduction in the risk of recurrent venous thromboembolism of 64 percent as compared with placebo.However, data from another trial show that full-dose warfarin is more effective than low-dose warfarin.2 Indeed, full-dose warfarin therapy has resulted in a relative reduction in risk of 90 percent.3In addition, the risk of bleeding is similar with the two intensities of warfarin treatment (Table 1).Hence, the added efficacy of conventional, full-dose warfarin is not offset by an increase in the risk of major bleeding episodes, and the only possible evidence-based conclusion is that full-dose warfarin therapy is preferable to low-dose warfarin therapy.
Source: New England Journal of Medicine
Institution: Maimonides Medical Center
Language: English
Subfield: Internal Medicine
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1911110901