Researchers have published a new study suggesting that clinical monitoring may help spot patients at risk for Xarelto bleeding before they suffer Xarelto side effects.

Xarelto is a type of drug called an anticoagulant, or blood thinner. Anticoagulants like Xarelto interfere with the ability to form blood clots.

In a normal, healthy person, a blood clot is a normal part of the healing process. However, under certain circumstances, this can happen inside the body. When this happens, the blood clot can block important blood vessels, like those that feed the heart, lungs, or brain.

This causes certain types of heart attacks, pulmonary embolism (PE), and stroke, respectively. Drugs like Xarelto are designed to reduce the risk of dangerous blood clots in at-risk patients, like those that have already suffered a stroke, or those that have atrial fibrillation, an abnormal heart rhythm associated with an increased risk of stroke.

All anticoagulants carry certain risks, though Xarelto bleeding lawsuits allege that this drug carries special risks.

Whenever a patient takes an anticoagulant like Xarelto, there is a risk of uncontrolled bleeding. Since the body cannot form blood clots as easily as it normally would, a very minor injury can cause life-threatening bleeding events.

Certain parts of the body, like the lungs and digestive tract, can routinely experience minor injuries most people do not notice. However, on an anticoagulant like Xarelto, this can turn into a medical emergency.

Xarelto lawsuits have alleged that the drug has a special risk of serious medical emergencies, even compared to other anticoagulants. Specifically, older anticoagulants have reversal agents, drugs that can “shut down” the anticoagulant if bleeding events occur. However, Xarelto has no such agent, which critics argue makes it more dangerous than older, off-patent drugs that have lower profit margins for drug companies.

The Journal of Cardiology published a study in September suggesting that monitoring a patient’s blood can give doctors and patients a more accurate picture of how well the drug is working for the patients. Researchers found that some patients reacted differently to the drug, making it hard to predict which patients had a higher risk of complications. Researchers recommended that patients on Xarelto have blood tests to determine how effective the drug is.

However, one of the key selling points of Xarelto over older anticoagulants is that it was approved for use without such blood tests. For older anticoagulants like Warfarin, periodic blood tests are the norm for patients on the drug. Such tests could damage one of the key marking strategies for the makers of Xarelto.