Edoxaban Tosylate

TUESDAY, Nov. 19, 2024 -- Japanese researchers say they have found a pill that works as well as existing medication to prevent blood clots after heart valve surgery, with fewer trips to the doctor. Unlike warfarin , the standard treatment, edoxaban does not require regular monitoring of blood clotting activity and doesn't interact with other meds. "Edoxaban could make life easier for patients recovering from heart valve surgery," said study leader Dr. Chisato Izumi , of the National Cerebral and Cardiovascular Center in Suita, Japan. "Since this medication does not require regular blood tests to monitor anticoagulation activity and can be taken in a fixed dose, without fears of interaction with food or other medications, it reduces the burden on patients and improves their quality of life, especially in those crucial first few months after surgery," she added. Izumi presented her team's findings Monday at a meeting of the American Heart Association in Chicago. Research presented at meetings is considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved edoxaban in 2015 for patients with a form of atrial fibrillation (A-fib) caused by rapid and irregular beating of the heart's top chambers, not a heart valve problem. For this trial, researchers compared its use to warfarin in about 400 patients in Japan who had heart valve replacement surgery. Participants received either edoxaban or warfarin for 12 weeks. Compared to warfarin, edoxaban was as effective -- or even more so -- in preventing stroke and blood clots, researchers said. In all, 0.5% of edoxaban patients had a stroke or embolism compared to 1.5% of those who took warfarin. However, 4.1% in the edoxaban group had major bleeding, compared to 1% of the warfarin group. One patient taking warfarin had a fatal brain hemorrhage, but there were no brain hemorrhages or fatal bleeding in edoxaban patients. None of the edoxaban patients suffered a blood clot in the heart, but 1% of warfarin patients did. Finally, those taking edoxaban did have higher rates of gastrointestinal bleeding than those taking warfarin (2.1% versus 0%). "Our findings show that edoxaban could help prevent blood clots as effectively as warfarin, indicating it is a viable post-surgery treatment alternative to consider for patients who have received a bioprosthetic heart valve replacement," Izumi said in a meeting news release. Researchers said additional study is needed to learn which patients are more likely to bleed if they take edoxaban, and how to reduce that risk. They noted that both patients and doctors knew which medication participants were receiving, which could have biased the results. The study did not include patients whose valves were replaced with man-made devices. Whatever your topic of interest, subscribe to our newsletters to get the best of Drugs.com in your inbox.

MONDAY, Nov. 18, 2024 -- People on blood thinners have a doubled risk of dangerous internal bleeding if they also take a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) like ibuprofen or naproxen, a new study warns. People typically are prescribed blood thinners to treat or prevent strokes , heart attacks, or blood clots in the legs or lungs, researchers said. NSAIDs also are known to thin the blood, and the new study shows that they can increase risk of uncontrolled bleeding in the gut, brain, lungs and bladder if taken alongside a blood thinner. “We found that for patients taking blood thinners for blood clots in the legs or lungs, using NSAIDs doubled the risk of bleeding compared with not using NSAIDs,” said researcher Soren Riis Peterson , a medical student with Aarhus University Hospital in Denmark. “The increased bleeding risk associated with NSAID use was not limited to the digestive tract but also seemed to affect other organ systems.” For the study, researchers analyzed data on nearly 52,000 Danish patients prescribed a blood thinner to treat a blood clot between 2012 and 2022. In Denmark, the NSAIDs diclofenac and naproxen can only be obtained through a prescription. This allowed researchers to track the health of patients who had been prescribed both a blood thinner and an NSAID. Overall, the risk of a bleed was two times higher when people took a blood thinner and an NSAID, compared to just taking a blood thinner, researchers found. The specific risk was four times higher for naproxen, three times higher for diclofenac and nearly twice as high for ibuprofen. Specific bleed risks included: Using NSAIDs with a blood thinner also tripled a person’s risk of anemia, researchers found. The pattern of risk remained similar across a wide variety of blood thinners, including rivaroxaban , apixaban , dabigatran , edoxaban and warfarin , results show. The new study was published Nov. 17 in the European Heart Journal . “For people taking blood thinners for blood clots in their legs or lungs, our research highlights the importance of being cautious when considering NSAIDs for pain or inflammation,” Petersen concluded in a journal news release. “We recommend that patients consult their doctor before taking NSAIDs along with a blood thinner.” In an accompanying editorial, Dr. Robert Storey , a professor of clinical cardiology with the University of Sheffield in the U.K., noted that NSAIDs are widely used, making up about 8% of prescriptions worldwide and often available over-the-counter. “It seems clear that avoiding NSAIDs in combination with [blood thinners] is the safest strategy to avoid excess bleeding risk,” Storey wrote. “However, if this is not possible, what mitigation can be put in place? NSAID prescription should obviously be at the lowest dose and for the shortest time possible, but choice of agent and route may also be important.” Whatever your topic of interest, subscribe to our newsletters to get the best of Drugs.com in your inbox.