Aspirin Not Worth Risks for Healthy Women
Conventional wisdom has long suggested that aspirin may help stave off heart attacks or strokes. But a new study suggests that aspirin will not benefit most healthy women, and could cause side effects like bleeding ulcers and bruising.
The Dutch findings, published in the European Heart Journal, suggest many women needlessly take the drug. Researchers say 50 women will need to take the medication for 10 years for just one to be helped — and only if they are at high risk of heart attacks or strokes to begin with.
The researchers 28,000 healthy women age 45 and above who had received either aspirin or dummy pills in an earlier U.S. trial. Overall, aspirin cut the rate of heart attacks, strokes and death from heart disease from 2.4 percent to 2.2 percent.
The new study contradicts advice from leading medical groups like the American Heart Association. Dutch researchers did say that women over the age of 65 tend to benefit more than average from taking aspirin regularly.
Do you take aspirin regularly?