Tranexamic acid is beneficial as adjunctive therapy in treating major upper gastrointestinal bleeding in dialysis patients.

BACKGROUND

In a pilot, non-randomized trial we tested the efficacy of tranexamic acid (TXA), a potent fibrinolytic inhibitor, as adjunctive therapy in standard treatment of major upper gastrointestinal bleeding in dialysis patients.

METHODS

Twenty consecutive patients (12 male, eight female; 63+/-8 years) with 36 episodes of major upper gastrointestinal bleeding were included in the study. In 16 episodes of bleeding TXA was used (in a dosage of 20 mg intravenously, followed for the next 4 weeks by 10 mg/kg/48 h orally), whereas in 20 other cases of bleeding, TXA was not used. The decision to use TXA was left to the attending physician's clinical judgement, resulting in all the more severe cases of bleeding being treated with TXA.

RESULTS

Treatment including TXA was shown to be beneficial (relative to cases not treated with TXA) in terms of decreasing the rate of early re-bleeding (in the first week, 0 vs 6, P<0.05), the rate of early and late re-bleeding (in the first month, 1 vs 8, P<0.05), the rate of repeated endoscopic procedures (in the first month, 1 vs 8, P<0.05) and the number of blood transfusions needed (in the first month, 1.4+/-1.3 vs 2.6+/-1.5 units, P<0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

The results of this pilot study suggest that TXA can be beneficial in the treatment of major upper gastrointestinal bleeding in dialysis patients. This remains to be definitely confirmed in a randomized study.