Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
A daily regimen of low-dose aspirin may not actually help you prevent a heart attack or stroke – in fact, it might actually do more harm than good, according to a new study.
Dr. Salim Virani, a cardiologist and assisting professor of medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine, and his colleagues report that approximately one-tenth of all people on aspirin therapy to reduce cardiovascular risk were doing so unnecessarily.
They looked at the health records of nearly 69,000 people who were receiving aspirin for primary prevention at 119 different facilities in the US, and found that nearly 8,000 of them had too low of a risk to need the treatment to prevent a heart attack or stroke.
“Some 7,972 had a less than 6% chance of having a heart attack or stroke within the next 10 years,” Dr. Virani told CNN.com on Friday, adding that doing so “can cause more harm than good. It can cause gastrointestinal bleeding, ulcers and… [bleeding] inside the brain.”
“The brain area can’t accommodate a lot of blood and you can die,” he added. Furthermore, an unneeded aspiring regimen can cause your blood to become thinner, which could be an issue if and when you need to undergo surgery.
As part of the study, Dr. Virani and experts from the University of Colorado, the Michael E. DeBakey Veteran Affairs Medical Center in Houston and the Mid America Heart Institute at Saint Luke’s Hospital in Kansas City reviewed the data of 68,808 patients listed in the National Cardiovascular Disease Registry’s Practice Innovation and Clinical Excellence registry.
They found an 11.6 percent frequency of inappropriate aspirin use throughout the entire cohort, and explained that there was significant practice-level variation in these figures (ranging from 0 percent to nearly 71.8 percent, with a median of 10.1 percent). The study authors published their findings this month in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Furthermore, even patients who should be using an aspirin regimen need to be careful, according to CNN.com. The recommended dosage is just 81 milligrams, equivalent to a baby aspirin in the US, and taking more than that can increase a person’s risk of suffering side effects.
“People weigh the concern of the risks of heart disease over the risk of the side effects. We underestimate the side effects,” Dr. Sharon Bergquist, an assistant professor of medicine at the Emory School of Medicine, told the website.
“Those who have that less than 6 percent risk should be maximizing lifestyle reduction efforts rather than a medication such as aspirin,” she added. Those lifestyle reduction efforts include getting enough exercise, a proper diet, reducing stress levels and getting enough sleep.
People who are currently on an aspirin regimen but don’t need to be should consult with their doctors before stopping, though, in light of a 2011 British Medical Journal study which found that quitting the treatment could increase their risk of a non-fatal heart attack by 60 percent.
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