Every 37 seconds one person in the western world dies from a blood clot, and sitting for too long could increase your risk of forming one somewhere in your system.
Health on Female First
And it’s not just sitting that causes the risk of thrombosis either, major surgery, such as orthopaedic or surgery for cancer, or extended time in the hospital, heart diseases, pregnancy, smoking, hormone therapy, being overweight/obesity, dehydration, family history and cancer can all be factors in the forming of clots which could result in death.
Dr Hilary Jones
Monday 13th October is the inaugural World Thrombosis Day - a new awareness day dedicated to focusing attention on deadly blood clots and in aid of this we spoke to Dr Hilary Jones all about it.
Could you tell us what World from Thrombosis day aims to do?
The point of world thrombosis day is simply to raise awareness of the significance of thrombosis, and its implications for long term health. Every thirty-seven seconds in the western world somebody dies from blood clots, which is startling in itself. In the U.K something like 1 in every thousand people will develop a deep vein thrombosis every year, and if those people aren’t treated one in 10 of them will go on to have a pulmonary embolism, and that occurs where a blood clot in the leg will break off and travel around the circulation to the lungs causing a potentially life threatening situation. So it is common, there are many people who are at risk some more than others and if we can raise awareness of the signs and symptoms and tell people about treatments we can go a long way to preventing some of these very significant conditions.
What are the other most important things people need to know about DVT?
Well I think particularly for purpose of this interview women need to know that there sometimes more at risk if there’s a personal previous history of embolism or thrombosis if they’ve had a blood clot before they might be more at risk, if there’s a family history, if it runs in the family then they should be more aware that they are at increased risk. If they are pregnant for example their risk of thrombosis is five times higher than when they are not pregnant if there on the oral contraceptive pill or taking other hormones, if there inactive for any reason, if there suffering from an injury and they can’t get around, if they’ve just had surgery if they’ve had any injury to the leg then that could damage a vein and the damage to the vein could cause a blood clot. So there are many underlying prius positions that could make a blood clot more likely.
You need to consider family health history when it comes to blood clots
How can we minimize the risk of contracting deep veins thrombosis?
Well the first thing is to stop smoking, because smoking tobacco increases the stickiness of blood and makes blood clots more likely. We can normalise weight, that always helps and exercising regularly certainly helps in the same way we tell people taking a long hall airplane flight to keep moving and to wear compression stockings and rotate their ankles that makes the muscles in the calf pumps the blood through the veins and stop the blood and the deep veins from stagnating and becoming more likely to clot. So regular exercise is important, the wearing of stockings if you notice that your ankles tend to swell that’s important. So all those things can help but I think also recognising the signs and symptoms of DVT and a pulmonary embolism is vital.
That’s my final question, so what are the warning signs for DVT?
Well for DVT a pain and tenderness in the calf which isn’t explained by exercise the previous day and if it’s on one side swelling of the ankle and foot, redness in the area with dilation of the surface veins and increase warmth of the skin compared to the other side, they would be symptoms very suggestive of a deep vein thrombosis and if you think that the blood clots can break off and travel in the circulation to the lungs to develop a pulmonary embolism the signs and symptoms of that would be quite different there you’d be short of breath, you’d have chest pain the heart rate would be higher, you might even be coughing blood and feel light-headed. So recognising those signs and symptoms and getting something done very urgently if you think you have them I think is vital.
What would be the current treatment if you suspected you had a deep vein thrombosis?
If the diagnosis is confirmed you’d be given anticoagulants to keep the blood from clotting further and from any clot extending and travelling around the body. So for the last 50 years we’ve been using warfarin tablets, warfarin is otherwise known as people call it rat poison because it’s the same thing to induce excess bleeding in rats to control their populations, but actually for 50 years it’s been our standard anticoagulants. There is a problem with warfarin and that it has to be carefully monitored in terms of its dose people will respond to different doses so we have to monitor their blood on a once or twice weekly basis to take a blood test to make sure they’re on the right dose. Also they can’t take some medicines and certain food stuff has to be avoided when taking it, however in recent years some novel oral anticoagulants have come on the market which have simplified the treatment in that these people don’t when there taking it need to have regular blood test monitoring and its less likely to interact with some of those foods and medicines that warfarin interacts with. So we have more choice in terms of treatment and I think people are more likely to be able to spot those people who are most at risk particularly if they come into hospital.
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