![]() ![]() Patients were about 80 years old on average and more than half were women. ![]() To see how often atrial fibrillation patients received blood thinners to avert clots, Xian and colleagues examined data on patients hospitalized for stroke from 2012 to 2015 in one of 1,622 hospitals participating in the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association’s “Get With the Guidelines–Stroke” program. Atrial fibrillation patients have up to seven times the stroke risk of people without the disorder.Ītrial fibrillation makes stroke up to five times more likely, and accounts for up to 15 percent of all ischemic strokes. This can lead to the formation of clots that can then travel through the arteries. ![]() As a result, blood doesn’t move as well to the heart’s lower chambers. In atrial fibrillation, electrical impulses in the upper chambers of the heart are chaotic, causing that part of the heart muscle to quiver rather than contracting normally. “Even in rare cases where therapeutic anticoagulation failed to prevent a stroke, patients who were taking (newer anticoagulants) or warfarin were 35 to 44 percent less likely to experience severe stroke, 21 to 25 percent less likely to die, and 40 to 50 percent more likely to function independently after a stroke,” Xian added by email. Ying Xian, a neurology researcher at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina. “Atrial fibrillation patients not taking anticoagulants or taking inadequate anticoagulants are at high risk for stroke,” said lead study author Dr. ![]() The study focused on more than 94,000 stroke patients with atrial fibrillation, an irregular rapid heartbeat that can lead to stroke, heart failure and chronic fatigue.īefore their stroke, just 16 percent of these atrial fibrillation patients were taking adequate doses of older anticoagulants, which are also known as blood thinners, such as heparin or warfarin (Coumadin) that lengthen the time it takes for clots to form in the blood or of newer anticoagulants like dabigatran (Pradaxa), rivaroxaban (Xarelto) or apixaban (Eliquis). Most strokes occur when a clot blocks an artery carrying blood to the brain, known as an ischemic stroke. Patient Eilleen Corrigin has blood drawn at an anti-coagulation clinic at the Staten Island University Hospital in Staten Island, New York May 7, 2012. ![]()
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