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Making (Anti)Sense of Factor XI in Thrombosis.
N Engl J Med. 2014 Dec 7;
Authors: Flaumenhaft R
Abstract
Inhibiting thrombosis without inducing bleeding is the holy grail of anticoagulant therapy. Currently, there are no commercially available anticoagulants that achieve this goal. Although many antithrombotic agents improve survival by interfering with vessel thrombosis, this protection always comes at the cost of an increased risk of bleeding. The observation that inhibitors of thrombosis increase bleeding is no surprise. Current dogma holds that the same blood constituents and mechanisms that are responsible for generating thrombin and fibrin to prevent excessive blood loss (hemostasis) can cause vessel stenosis or occlusion under pathologic conditions (thrombosis). But what if this were not the case? . . .
PMID: 25482334 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]