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Sign Up Now ForNew guidelines for aspirin use, from the Harvard Heart Letter
Aspirin was once used mainly to relieve pain and ease fever. Today it’s best known for its ability to protect hearts. Updated recommendations from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force fill in two big gaps—about aspirin for women and about the safest dose to take. But the new recommendations don’t provide a cookie-cutter approach. Instead, they emphasize weighing the benefits of aspirin therapy against the risks, reports the June 2009 issue of the Harvard Heart Letter.
In general, you should consider taking aspirin if its benefits outweigh its risks. It makes the most sense if your chance of having a heart attack or stroke (calculated online or with your doctor) is greater than the odds of aspirin causing a problem. For men, the main benefit is preventing a heart attack. For women, it’s preventing ischemic stroke, the most common kind of stroke. For both, the risks are gastrointestinal bleeding and hemorrhagic stroke. The task force sets several tipping points based on age and sex. Although these numbers are helpful, they’re impersonal. Your doctor can help you work through the recommendations with your health considerations in mind.
Trials evaluating the heart benefits of aspirin have tested doses ranging from 500 milligrams (mg) a day to 100 mg every other day. The task force says there still isn’t enough evidence to say which one is best. But it concludes that a dose of 81 mg a day, the amount in a baby aspirin, seems to work just as well as higher doses, with fewer bleeding problems.
The Harvard Heart Letter notes that aspirin isn’t a miracle worker. If you’re really serious, there’s a lot more you can do: quit smoking, maintain a healthy weight, exercise daily, choose a healthful diet, and drink alcohol in moderation.
Read the full-length article: "New guidelines refine aspirin prescription"
Also in this issue of the Harvard Heart Letter
- Heart attack risk calculators
- June 2009 references and further reading
- Defining a moderate-intensity workout
- Exercise equals angioplasty for leg pain
- Treat "mini-strokes" as an emergency, not a gentle warning
- New guidelines refine aspirin prescription
- Heart Beat: Atrial fibrillation and blood pressure
- Heart Beat: Billions for heart care
- In brief
- Ask the doctor: How did my blood pressure suddenly become normal?
- Ask the doctor: Why aren't prevention efforts stopping an increase in heart disease?
- Ask the doctor: Do I need to take precautions if I stop taking warfarin before a colonoscopy?
- Ask the doctor: Will a memory-boosting supplement interfere with my heart medications?
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About Harvard Health Publications
Harvard Health Publications publishes five monthly newsletters--Harvard Health Letter, Harvard Women's Health Watch, Harvard Men's Health Watch, Harvard Mental Health Letter, and Harvard Heart Letter--as well as more than 50 special health reports and books drawing on the expertise of the 8,000 faculty physicians at Harvard Medical School and its world-famous affiliated hospitals.