14 DAY TRIAL // Aspirin is more than just a painkiller, antipyretic and anti-inflammatory drug, says a new study on 95,000 patients, led by a Duke University Medical Center.
According to the researchers, aspirin can significantly reduce the risk of cardiovascular events, including stroke, heart attack and death due to cardiovascular disease, in both men and women.
However, the study concluded that there are major differences between the acetylsalicylic acid's benefits on men and women.
For men, aspirin lowered the risk of a heart attack, while in women aspirin reduced the risk of a stroke.
"Aspirin is a drug that has been used for many years - it is well-understood, effective, inexpensive and widely available. This is good news because many of the past studies of the effect of aspirin in preventing cardiovascular events looked only at men, so physicians were reluctant to prescribe aspirin for women because there was little data," Berger continued. "But now, the combined data of recent trials involving women demonstrates that women can benefit just as much from aspirin therapy as men," said Jeffrey Berger, first author of the paper.
The analysis revealed that aspirin conferred a 12 percent reduction in risk in cardiovascular events for women, and a 14 percent reduction for men.
However, there are risks associated with the routine use of aspirin, especially in terms of major bleeding episodes.
Researchers noticed that the routine aspirin use for an average of 6.4 years would lead to 2.5 major bleeding events per 1,000 women and 3 major bleeding events per 1,000 men.
"[..] We believe that many more people could benefit from taking aspirin, it is important for patients and their physicians to discuss the issue and weigh the benefits and potential drawbacks to this therapy. Also, aspirin should never replace other ways of reducing cardiovascular risks, such as eating a proper diet and exercising," Berger also said.