When Are Blood Thinners Dangerous?

 

Blood thinners offer patients with blood clotting issues a better chance of survival in most cases. However, they are also known to be very dangerous if they are used improperly. When doctors don't inform patients about the risks of blood thinners or don't administer the medications properly, patients can be significantly injured, even suffering death in some situations.

Guest post by Mario Cattabiani

What Are Blood Thinners?

Blood thinners, or anticoagulants, are used to slow the natural clotting process of blood. You may be familiar with such blood thinners as Heparin, Coumadin, Plavix, and Pradaxa.

Anticoagulants are prescribed for or administered to patients at risk of pulmonary embolism, deep vein thrombosis, atrial fibrillation, and other medical conditions in which a stroke or heart attack is possible. They are also given to people who have already had a stroke or heart attack to reduce the risk of reoccurrence or additional damage. Blood thinners are sometimes used during kidney dialysis or bypass surgery to keep blood from clotting in medical equipment tubing.

While anticlotting medications are meant to treat or prevent serious and potentially life-threatening medical conditions, they can be extremely dangerous. Many of these types of drugs have a very small room for error. Even the slightest mistake in dosage or strength can result in devastating outcomes.

How Can Blood Thinners Hurt People?

The ways that medications like Coumadin and Heparin can cause injury include:

·         Incorrect dosage prescribed – When a patient overdoses on blood thinners, it can result in severe bleeding throughout the body, brain, or heart.

·         Incorrect labeling of medication – In some cases, patients have received prescriptions three times more potent than those listed on the actual tablet. This error could lead to severe injuries and death.

·         Medication and food interactions – Blood thinner have adverse reactions when combined with some other medications. If doctors don't correctly educate their patients who take blood thinners, this can result in injuries. Additionally, some foods act as natural blood thinners, so if they are combined with anticoagulants, it may increase the drug's effects and potency. Doctors must make sure that patients receive and understand this important information.  

·         Insufficient blood monitoring – If doctors fail to test patients' blood to ensure that they maintain the proper level of blood thinners in the body, patients are at risk of a severe bleed.

·         Human error when giving medication – Medical staff who administer blood thinners to patients may misread dosing instructions or administer the wrong dose, placing patients at risk of suffering an adverse event.

What Are The Risks Of Blood Thinner Errors?

If a patient who is taking blood thinners falls outside of the range that is considered therapeutic, significant consequences can occur. This may include catastrophic injuries such as stroke, heart attack, irreversible organ damage, and death. Regular monitoring and INR blood testing must be done consistently to help avoid these complications.

When anticoagulants are used improperly, it can cause the following:

·         Subdural bleed

·         Brain injury

·         Brain hemorrhage

·         Bleeding into the brain

·         Excessive bleeding in the body

·         Death

In some cases, blood thinner-related injuries result from mistakes made by pharmacists who fill prescriptions incorrectly or nurses who administer the drugs in the wrong doses.

 

Mario Cattabiani is the Director of Communications at Ross Feller Casey, LLP, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Pharmaceutical Microbiology Resources (http://www.pharmamicroresources.com/)

Marine bacteria in Canadian Arctic biodegrade diesel and oil

 

Marine bacteria in the frigid waters of the Canadian Arctic are capable of biodegrading oil and diesel fuel. Genomic sequencing revealed unexpected potential for hydrocarbon bioremediation in lineages of bacteria including Paraperlucidibaca, Cycloclasticus, and Zhongshana.

 

The Labrador coast -- where the study took place -- is important for Indigenous peoples who rely on the ocean for food, and that unlike at lower latitudes, there's been a dearth of research on bioremediation this far north.

 

 

As climate change extends ice-free periods and increasing industrial activity takes place in the Arctic, it is important to understand the ways in which the Arctic marine microbiome will respond if there is an oil or fuel spill. This region remains vast and remote such that oil spill emergency response would be complicated and slow.

 

In the study, the investigators simulated oil spill remediation inside of bottles, by combining mud from the top few centimeters of seabed with artificial seawater, and with either diesel or crude oil, along with different nutrient amendments at different concentrations.

 

The experiments were performed at 4°C, to approximate the temperature in the Labrador Sea, and took place over several weeks.

 

See:

 

Sean M. C. Murphy, María A. Bautista, Margaret A. Cramm, Casey R. J. Hubert. Biodegradation of diesel and crude oil by Labrador Sea cold adapted microbial communities. Applied and Environmental Microbiology, 2021; DOI: 10.1128/AEM.00800-21

 

Posted by Dr. Tim Sandle, Pharmaceutical Microbiology Resources (http://www.pharmamicroresources.com/)

New national atlas for listeria

 

Among the deadliest of foodborne pathogens, Listeria monocytogenessoon may become easier to track down in food recalls and other investigations, thanks to a new genomic and geological mapping tool created by Cornell University food scientists.

 

The national atlas will tell scientists where listeria and other related species reside within the contiguous United States, which could help them trace and pinpoint sources of listeria found in ingredients, food processing facilities and finished products.

 

Listeria mononcytogenes in foods can make people extremely sick. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate that each year 1,600 people in the U.S. get listeriosis; of those, about 260 die.

 

Knowing that listeria occurs naturally in soil, the Cornell group asked hundreds of other scientists across the country to scoop up soil samples from generally undisturbed places in the natural world, such as the off-trail areas of state and national parks.

 

From these samples, the group developed a nationwide atlas of 1,854 listeria isolates, representing 594 strains and 12 families of the bacteria called phylogroups.

 

This work can serve as a reference for future population genomics studies and will likely benefit the food industry by locating listeria contaminations that may have a natural origin.

 

If listeria is found in a processing facility in the western U.S., for example, and that facility had used ingredients from a distant state.

 

See:

 

Jingqiu Liao, Xiaodong Guo, Daniel L. Weller, Shaul Pollak, Daniel H. Buckley, Martin Wiedmann, Otto X. Cordero. Nationwide genomic atlas of soil-dwelling Listeria reveals effects of selection and population ecology on pangenome evolution. Nature Microbiology, 2021; 6 (8): 1021 DOI: 10.1038/s41564-021-00935-7

 

Posted by Dr. Tim Sandle, Pharmaceutical Microbiology Resources (http://www.pharmamicroresources.com/)