Oral Rivaroxaban in Symptomatic Deep Vein Thrombosis

To evaluate the efficacy of oral rivaroxaban compared to warfarin in patients with deep vein thrombosis (DVT).

Open label randomized controlled study.

Department of General Medicine, Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), Islamabad from January 2016 to January 2018.

Patients of both genders between 18 and 60 years of age with Doppler ultrasound-confirmed DVT were included in the study. Pregnant patients and those with advanced liver, renal disease, those with a previous history of DVT, malignancy, with a platelets count of less than 50000/ul were excluded from the study. Rivaroxaban was given in a dose of 15 mg twice daily for 21 days followed by 20 mg once daily. Patients in the warfarin group were given heparin for 3 to 5 days followed by warfarin for 3 to 6 months. The primary efficacy outcome was patency of the vessel at 3 and 6 months of treatment. The principal safety outcomes were major and minor bleeding during the study period.

A total of 151 patients with acute symptomatic deep vein thrombosis were enrolled in the study. Half of the patients were given warfarin and the other half rivaroxaban for 6 months. At three months, there were no significant differences observed in vessel patency in the rivaroxaban group (22.4%) as compared to warfarin group (26.7%) but after 6 months of therapy, vessel patency was significantly more in the rivaroxaban group. Adverse events did not show any significant differences Conclusion: Rivaroxaban had an efficacy superior to warfarin in terms of vessel patency after six months of therapy but adverse events were similar in both the groups.