Treatment of Deep vein thrombosis

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Treatment of DVT and PE is with blood-thinning drugs or anticoagulants, including warfarin and heparin. Aspirin in low doses also acts as a blood thinning drug and is used to prevent clotting conditions in the arteries like coronary thrombosis. Its benefit in preventing DVT is debatable.

A large established deep vein thrombosis is sometimes treated with a drug that can actually dissolve the clot. Clot-dissolving enzymes, such as streptokinase and urokinase, have been in use for many years, but TPA appears to have several major advantages over these earlier drugs.

There have been recent concerns about the effects of cranberry juice on the effectiveness of warfarin. The Committee on Safety of Medicines is is currently reviewing reports, which suggest that cranberry juice acts to increase the potency of warfarin and may therefore increase the risk of haemorrhage. Present advice is to avoid or limit drinking cranberry juice if you are taking warfarin, until the situation has been investigated further.