After bioprosthetic aortic valve replacement, patients who took the oral drug warfarin had better outcomes including lower mortality rates and fewer blood clots, according to new research from Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic.
Researchers examined the outcomes of more than 10,000 patients who received a bioprosthetic aortic valve replacement — a procedure that is becoming increasingly common, Mayo Clinic says — and found that patients who were given warfarin for postoperative treatment had a 32% lower mortality risk.
Typically, there is some hesitancy around giving a patient an anticoagulant drug so soon after a surgery due to risks of bleeding, according to Hartzell Schaff, MD, a Mayo Clinic cardiovascular surgeon who contributed to the study, but the benefits may outweigh the risks.
"The findings support early warfarin use in appropriately selected patients, such as patients with low bleeding risk," Dr. Schaff, stated in the Dec. 7 news release. "There's often reluctance to prescribe anticoagulant treatment early after surgery due to concerns about bleeding and uncertainty about benefits. Our research finds that the small increased hazard of bleeding (4% versus 2.3%) may be an acceptable risk given the benefits in terms of mortality risk as well as reduced risk of thromboembolism."