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  • Important Info You Need to Know about Blood Thinners

    Important Info You Need to Know about Blood Thinners

    Blood thinners are commonly prescribed for people with atrial fibrillation and pulmonary embolisms. Common blood thinners, or anticoagulants, are coumadin and warfarin. These medications can be very important, but they do have some side effects that people, especially older men, need to be aware of. Here’s the important info you need to know about blood thinners.

    Important Info on Blood Thinners

    What They’re For

    Blood thinners are commonly prescribed for atrial fibrillation. A fib, as it’s commonly shortened to, is a condition that causes the patient’s heart to beat irregularly. Defibrillation pads are also commonly used to address an acute incident of fibrillation, essentially stopping and restarting a heart that is beating irregularly.

    Blood thinners are also prescribed for those suffering from pulmonary embolism. A pulmonary embolism is a blockage in one of the arteries of your lung. This is a problem, of course, as the lung is where your blood goes to receive oxygen. Blood thinners prevent your blood from clotting, thus breaking up the embolism.

    Prescription

    You can only get blood thinners via prescriptions. They’re not available over the counter. That’s because they have a lot of side effects that you should be aware of, and you should only take blood thinners as directed by your doctor. Blood thinners don’t actually thin your blood: they’re more accurately referred to as anticoagulants.

    That’s because coumadin and warfarin primarily are given to prevent blood from clotting as easily. These medicines do so by blocking certain proteins in the blood from doing their job, preventing your platelets from clotting up.

    Side Effects

    As you may be guessing, there are some notable side effects to this type of medication. Since it prevents your blood from clotting, when you’re on anticoagulants, you need to avoid becoming injured. That might seem like silly advice, as you would of course normally avoid injury. However, being on anticoagulants means you should shift your priorities.

    Since your body can’t create blood clots, you need to avoid any strenuous or dangerous activity altogether. Something as simple as a cut from a kitchen knife could be deadly if you can’t stop bleeding. This goes double for internal injuries. If you were to get in a car accident and had internal bleeding, it would be incredibly difficult to get it to stop.

    If you do become injured while on blood thinners, wrap the injury and apply pressure to it, then call your doctor. If the bleeding is severe, call an ambulance and go to the emergency room. The same goes if you think you may have internal bleeding: don’t waste any time. Call an ambulance and get medical help as soon as possible.

  • What You Should Know about Blood Thinners

    What You Should Know about Blood Thinners

    There are a number of anticoagulants, or blood thinners, on the market. These medications, like warfarin and coumadin, these keep clots from forming in your blood stream. That’s why they’re called anticoagulants, as they keep your blood from coagulating. However, you might be surprised to learn about some of the facts regarding blood thinners potential effects on your health. Are blood thinners safe for you to take?

    Facts You Need to Know About Blood Thinners

    What are Blood Thinners Prescribed For?

    Generally speaking, coumadin, warfarin and the like are prescribed to treat issues like blood clots, atrial fibrillation, pulmonary embolisms and various heart surgeries. They are also often prescribed for procedures like hip replacement. Contrary to popular conception, despite being called blood thinners, these medications don’t actually thin out your blood. Instead, they keep your blood from clotting. This can cause issues in some patient.

    The most commonly prescribed forms of these medications are coumadin and warfarin. They work primarily by blocking K vitamins from operating in the blood. Vitamin K is the molecule responsible for causing platelets to clump together and clot. The use of this medication in recent years has widened to include treatment of atrial fibrillation.

    Other Forms of Blood Thinners

    Warfarin and coumadin are the most common types of blood thinners prescribed, but they’re not the only medications out there for those with atrial fibrillation and the like. Since 2010, in fact, several notable medications have been released. These include Xarelto, Eliquis, and Pradaxa which can also treat conditions like deep vein thrombosis.

    Warfarin and coumadin require frequent blood tests in order to check on the patient’s liver. Unlike those medications, however, these newer medications have no such restrictions and are generally considered to be “safer” on the liver.

    Blood thinners like these are often taken in pill form, and they need not be taken with food in order to be effective. This is a commonly misunderstood aspect of anticoagulants. However, unlike coumadin and warfarin, these new medications don’t interact with as many foods.

    For instance, on traditional blood thinners, you need to be careful about eating foods that can include Vitamin K. Additionally you should also avoid ibuprofen and aspirin, as well as alcohol. This isn’t the case with these newer medications.

    Side Effects

    No anticoagulants are completely without side effects, of course. Whether you’re prescribed traditional anticoagulants or newer ones, there are a few things to keep in mind about these medications. The most major side effect to keep in mind is that these medications keep your blood from clotting even when you are injured. Remember, blood clotting is how your body stops itself from bleeding.

    So, in general, you need to avoid becoming injured in such a way that you would bleed. This probably sounds like a “well, duh,” piece of advice, but it’s worth noting. You don’t usually seek out injuries that will cause you to bleed, but while on blood thinners you need to double down on avoiding the sharp ends of things.

    In the evident that you do become injured or get cut, you need to apply pressure to injury right away. Apply constant pressure following the event until the bleeding subsides. This replicates your body’s normal processes to keep from bleeding. This is the simple one: more serious injuries are the ones that result in internal bleeding.

    If you incur a fall or something similar that could result in internal bleeding, keep your eyes open for unusually swelling and seek medial attention immediately in the case this occurs. If you don’t you might experience serious injury or worse.

    Non-Injury Side Effects

    There are other side effects related to anticoagulants that aren’t tied up in injuries. For instance, upset stomach, diarrhea and other gastrointestinal issues are occasionally reported while taking anticoagulants. Other effects include headaches and dizziness, fever and aches, and general flu-like effects.

    Due to these types of side effects, it’s widely recommended that those on this medication wear identification that explains they’re on anticoagulants. This is because, in the event of injury, doctors need to know that your blood won’t be clotting. If you go into surgery and the doctors don’t know that your blood isn’t going to clot then you’ll likely not survive the procedure.

    Hopefully this information is helpful to you. Remember, never take medication that you aren’t prescribed by your doctor, and only take the amount that you’re directed to by your doctor. If your doctor thinks anticoagulants are right for your condition, discuss potential side effects, foods to avoid and behaviors to engage in while on it.