Patients take blood thinners or anticoagulants in order to prevent potentially life-threatening conditions like heart attack, stroke, pulmonary embolism or deep vein thrombosis. Besides providing life saving benefits, these medications can cause increased chances of bleeding. However, anticoagulants interrupt the body’s normal clotting procedure & this increases the dentist’s concern for dental procedures that cause bleeding.
Heart conditions are the major public health concern in developing countries like India & approximately 80% of the population is affected. Anticoagulants are the widely used medications amongst the patients with heart conditions. Since clot formation can lead to heart attack or stroke, anticoagulants do not let the blood to clot inside the blood vessel.
Anticoagulants or blood thinners include: warfarin (Coumadin & generics), heparin, clopidroge (Plavix) & dabigatran etexilate (pradaxa), Aspirin (NSAIDs).
Blood Thinners & Dental procedures
If you are on blood thinners including aspirin, it’s highly important to inform your dentist before proceeding any surgical procedure.
As been mentioned, these medications interfere with clotting mechanism & therefore during surgical procedures make more difficult to control bleeding. However Dr Rajat Sachdeva, one of the best dentist in north delhi says that precautions & communication can prevent the interference during the procedure.
Surgical procedures like dental implants, extractions are not absolutely contraindicated in patients on blood thinners. For a patient of any age, evaluation of health status is absolutely important before beginning of any surgical procedure.
The surgeon assessing your condition should be very well aware of the drug dosage & duration in order to accommodate safe surgical procedures.
Before beginning with any surgical procedure, it’s important to undergo a test called PT/INR (PT: Prothrombin time, INR: International normalized ratio) to determine blood clotting tendency. The PT/INR levels ensure that one has sufficient ability to stop bleeding & heal well.
Just to make you aware that general procedure like cleanings, fillings do not require any discontinuation in the medicines prior to these procedures. Instead few local measures to control bleeding must be within the clinicians reach.
Measures to minimize bleeding after a dental procedure
Most invasive dental procedures cause bleeding, that is well controlled by following simple procedures.
After the completion of surgical procedure, your clinician would recommend you to bite on moist gauze for 30 minutes. The firm pressure on bleeding sites will usually stop bleeding.
Patients must be advised not to spit constantly & must avoid hot beverages & refrain from using a straw. Smoking should be strictly avoided for at least 24 hrs. Also, soft diet is mandatory for the first 2-3 days.
Instructions by your dentist must be strictly followed.
At Dr. Sachdeva’s Dental Institute, a renowned dental clinic in ashok vihar we make sure that our patients provide a thorough & complete medical history. We may ask our patients to undergo few tests before the treatment & consult their physician. We do not recommend any alteration or discontinuation in your medicines without the advice of your physician.
