INR VALUES WITH PATIENTS ON ORAL ANTICOAGULANT THERAPY DURING COVID-19 PANDEMICS

Abstract

Introduction: Oral anticoagulant therapy (OAT) is widely used for preventing and treating vein and arterial thrombosis. The OAT drug that is most commonly used is warfarin.

Aim of the paper: assess the effect of anti-pandemic measures on the frequency of disorders in INR values with patients who use warfarin.

Material and methods: This study includes 89 patients who use warfarin and who controlled their INR values University Clinical Center Tuzla. The available data base gave information about the patients including age, gender, diagnosis and INR values during 2019 and 2020 and these were compared.

Results: Among 89 examinees there were 57.3% (51) male patients and 42.7% (38) female patients. From the overall number of patients during 2019 51.7% (46) patients had recommended INR values while in 48.3% (43) patients there were INR oscillations outside the therapeutic range of warfarin effect. The average INR value in 2019 was 2.6 while in 2020 it was 1.7. The disorders of INR outside therapeutic range (INR<2.0 i INR>3.5) during 2019 was noticed in 21.3% (19), and in 2020 in 35.9% (32) patients. The results showed that 68.5% patients during pandemics didn’t regulate INR values.

Conclusion: The results of the examinations showed that the appearance of the COVID-19 pandemics resulted in the disorder of INR values with 61 (68.5%) patients who use warfarin regardless of the indication for usage, which is 20.2% higher in comparison to 2019.

Key words: warfarin, acenocoumarol, COVID-19 pandemics