The first results were presented at the 11th VTE Multidisciplinary Forum

The 11th VTE Multidisciplinary Forum, held in Valencia on May 7th and 8th, was the setting for the presentation of the first results of the use of rivaroxaban, one of the new oral anticoagulants (NOAC), direct-acting oral anticoagulants (DOACs), in daily hospital practice outside of clinical studies.

The results of practice have confirmed that these drugs cause less serious bleeding in patients, in addition to facilitating the control of prothrombin time or the INR index, being more convenient to take and lacking food interactions.

The meeting, organized by the Thromboembolic Disease Group of the Spanish Foundation of Internal Medicine (FEMI) and attended by more than 350 specialists from all over Spain, also served to confirm that “low-molecular-weight heparin in the acute phase of VTE is associated with fewer deaths if administered once a day instead of every 12 hours,” says Manuel Monreal, internist at the Hospital Germans Trias i Pujol of Badalona (Barcelona), coordinator of the Thromboembolic Disease Group of the FEMI.

“Patients over 80 years with VTE treated with anticoagulants bleed much more often than they recur. We should reconsider prolonging the duration of anticoagulation beyond a few months in some of these patients,” says Dr Monreal.

At the meeting it was also shown that at the end of anticoagulation for VTE, patients who took an aspirin a day had fewer recurrences than those who did not take aspirin; that in the last ten years the mean hospital stay of patients with pulmonary embolism has declined from a mean of 11 days to 9 days; that death from pulmonary embolism has decreased by half, and that patients with VTE who take antidepressants, anticonvulsives or antipsychotic drugs together with anticoagulants bleed more often and also seem to have more recurrences than those who do not take these drugs.

The VTE Multidisciplinary Forum is a space for the exchange of views on the disease. It is a place where medical specialists share, discuss and debate the status of the issue of thromboembolic disease in Spain.