Direct oral anticoagulants: first airbag

Abstract

The safety profile of oral anticoagulants (DOACs) was confirmed in the large-scale studies, the increased risk of hemorrhagic events does still exist, which may be caused by the nature of the patient’s concomitant pathology, the resulting injury or the need for emergency surgical procedures. Such measures to restore the coagulation cascade as the use of prothrombin complex concentrates or hemodialysis have not been widely used in the clinical practice to stop the anti-coagulant effect of DOACs and do not have an evidence base. Today, idarutsizumab (Praxbind) is the only specific antagonist to DOACs registered in the Russian Federation, a neutralizing agent that interacts with free and thrombin-related dabigatran, without affecting other blood coagulation factors and platelet function. RE-VERSE AD study showed that administration of idarucizumab in patients receiving dabigatran therapy and who developed life-threatening bleeding provided complete neutralization of the anti-coagulant effect of dabigatran for 4 hours, and after 1.5 hours emergency surgical treatment was performed, achieving at the same time, normal perioperative hemostasis in 93.4% of cases. The availability of a specific neutralizing agent for a specific DOAC could be identified as arguments in favour of choosing this drug for patients who have a high risk of a hemorrhagic event, emergency surgery or thrombolysis.

Keywords

• atrial fibrillation
• anticoagulant therapy
• direct oral anticoagulants
• neutralizing agent
• dabigatran
• idarucizumab
• thromboembolic complications
• hemorrhagic complications