Aged female patients taking low-dose aspirin should be paid special attention

Low-dose aspirin (LDA) is one of the main agents used for the prevention of thromboembolic vascular events, and has the advantages of both low cost and a prolonged duration of antiplatelet action; however, it is associated with a doubling of the risk of gastrointestinal bleeding, even at doses as low as 75 mg daily. The gender differences in the clinical manifestations of LDA-associated gastroduodenal mucosal injury have not been well studied.

A research team from Japan examined the clinical factors associated with LDA-associated peptic ulcer in 453 patients under treatment with LDA (298 males, 155 females) who underwent esophagogastroduodenoscopy at the Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology of Hiratsuka City Hospital between January 2003 and December 2007. Their study will be published on April 21, 2010 in the World Journal of Gastroenterology.

Their results illustrated that a history of peptic ulcer was found to be the risk factor for LDA-associated peptic ulcer common to both sexes. In female patients, age greater than 70 years was a significant risk factor, and the time to diagnosis as having LDA-associated peptic ulcer by endoscopy was significantly shorter than that in male patients. The results may represent a future strategy for prevention of LDA-associated gastroduodenal mucosal injury.

Reference: Okada K, Inamori M, Imajyo K, Chiba H, Nonaka T, Shiba T, Sakaguchi T, Atsukawa K, Takahashi H, Hoshino E, Nakajima A. Gender differences of low-dose aspirin-associated gastroduodenal ulcer in Japanese patients. World J Gastroenterol 2010; 16(15): 1896-1900

http://www.wjgnet.com/1007-9327/full/v16/i15/1896.htm

Correspondence to: Masahiko Inamori, MD, PhD, Gastroenterology Division, Yokohama City University School of Medicine, 3-9 Fukuura, Kanazawa-ku, Yokohama 236-0004, Japan. inamorim@med.yokohama-cu.ac.jp

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World Journal of Gastroenterology (WJG), a leading international journal in gastroenterology and hepatology, has established a reputation for publishing first class research on esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, liver cancer, viral hepatitis, colorectal cancer, and H. pylori infection and provides a forum for both clinicians and scientists. WJG has been indexed and abstracted in Current Contents/Clinical Medicine, Science Citation Index Expanded (also known as SciSearch) and Journal Citation Reports/Science Edition, Index Medicus, MEDLINE and PubMed, Chemical Abstracts, EMBASE/Excerpta Medica, Abstracts Journals, Nature Clinical Practice Gastroenterology and Hepatology, CAB Abstracts and Global Health. ISI JCR 2008 IF: 2.081. WJG is a weekly journal published by WJG Press. The publication dates are the 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th day of every month. WJG is supported by The National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 30224801 and No. 30424812, and was founded with the name of China National Journal of New Gastroenterology on October 1, 1995, and renamed WJG on January 25, 1998.