Summary
Acutelly-ill hospitalised medical patients are at risk of venous thromboembolism (VTE),
both in-hospital and in the immediate post-discharge period, and mortality from VTE
is thought to be particularly high in this patient population. However, despite previous
mandates from international antithrombotic guidelines such as those of the American
College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) for the “universal” use of thromboprophylaxis in
hospitalised medical patients, global audits suggest that implementation of thromboprophylaxis
continues to be challenging because of the perceived higher risk of bleeding and lower
risk of VTE than that reported in clinical trials. Recent population-based studies
also reveal that a “universal” hospital-only thromboprophylactic strategy does not
reduce the community burden of VTE from this population, which may constitute nearly
one quarter of the attributable risk of VTE. Lastly, four large randomised placebo-controlled
trials of extended thromboprophylaxis have failed to show a definitive net clinical
benefit in hospitalised medical patients. Recent large-scale efforts in deriving and
validating scored VTE and bleed risk assessment models (RAMs) have been completed
in the medically-ill population. In addition, an elevated D-dimer as a new biomarker
to identify at-VTE risk medically ill patients has also undergone prospective evaluation.
This paper will review current concepts of VTE and bleed risk in hospitalised medical
patients, both in the hospital as well as the post-hospital discharge period, and
will discuss new paradigms of thromboprophylaxis in this population using an individualised,
patient-centered approach.
Keywords Medical patient - risk assessment models - d-dimer - venous thromboembolism - bleeding
- thromboprophylaxis - Padua Score - NHS Tool - IMPROVE Score - low-molecular-weight
heparin - direct oral anticoagulants