To treat or not to treat very elderly naïve patients with atrial fibrillation with vitamin K antagonists (VKA): results from the VENPAF cohort.

Despite the recommendations in the guidelines, physicians still underuse warfarin in very elderly patients with non-valvular atrial fibrillation (NVAF). The risks of stroke and major bleeding both increase with age, but it is still not clear whether the beneficial effects of vitamin K antagonists (VKA) in preventing stroke outweigh the related bleeding risks in fragile, very elderly patients. The bleeding rates reported in real-world observational studies differ considerably. The aim of this study was to retrospectively assess the incidence of major bleeding in VKA-naïve patients over 80 years old with NVAF at a large anticoagulation clinic. Significant predictors of major bleeding were also investigated. Sixty-five major bleeding events (3.4 per 100 patient-years) and 25 thromboembolic events (1.3 per 100 patient-years) were recorded in a sample of 798 patients with a median follow-up of 2.2 years. Patients over 85 years old had significantly more major bleeding events than the 80- to 84-year olds (4.7 vs. 2.6 per 100 patient-years, p 0.014). Spontaneous bleeding was also significantly more common (3.0 vs. 1.3 per 100 patient-years, p 0.008) in the very elderly group. Age and diabetes were the only independent risk factor for bleeding on multivariate Cox analysis (Age HR 1.80, 95% CI 1.10-2.93; diabetes HR 1.76, 95% CI 1.00-3.09). These data show a sharp increase in major bleeding episodes among the very elderly with atrial fibrillation. Further studies are warranted with a view to identifying patients at risk.

A new D-dimer cutoff in bedridden hospitalized elderly patients.

Asymptomatic deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pulmonary embolism are leading causes of morbidity following the hospitalization of elderly people. The diagnosis of DVT is supported by the D-dimer laboratory assay. The concentration of D-dimer increases in patients with DVT, but may be high in other conditions too (i.e. cancer, infections and inflammation). Old age coincides with a physiological increase in D-dimer values, and that is why D-dimer assay in the elderly is characteristically highly sensitive but scarcely specific. The aim of our study was to explore the reliability of different D-dimer cutoffs for the diagnosis of asymptomatic DVT in a population of bedridden hospitalized elderly patients. We studied 199 patients who were a mean 86.3 ±â€Š6.7 years old. All participants underwent lower limb Doppler ultrasound (DUS) and D-dimer venous blood sampling on admission. In our cohort, the usual cutoff proved highly sensitive (100%), but its specificity was very poor (20.1%). To find a higher cutoff that could improve the method's specificity, we analyzed our data using a receiver operating characteristic curve analysis. The resulting D-dimer cutoff of 492 µg/l enabled us to retain the same sensitivity while improving the test's specificity to 39.1%, with a consequent improvement in its positive predictive value and accuracy. In addition to improving the method's reliability, this result may be helpful in clinical practice, in both medical wards and nursing homes. By adopting a cutoff of 492 µg/l, clinicians could significantly increase the proportion of older patients in whom DVT can be safely ruled out, reducing referrals for DUS and administration of heparin, with consequent clinical, practical and economic advantages.