ABSTRACT
Thrombotic disease, collectively accounts for the majority of deaths in developed countries. Several drugs of venerable lineage are used in the prevention of such events, notably heparin and warfarin, which interfere with the coagulation cascade; aspirin, which inhibits platelet aggregation; and streptokinase, which causes fibrinolysis. Antithrombotic drugs are often used in combination with each other and with other circulatory drugs. Such drugs frequently have narrow margins of safety and steep dose-response curves. Studies of possible drug interactions are also therefore essential early in the evaluation process. In practice, bleeding with thrombolytic drugs is usually related to invasive instrumentation and it may be that, with increasing experience of the agents, their use in healthy volunteers may become ethically justifiable, at least at low doses. Standard haematological tests provide measures of the effects of anti-thrombotic drugs on the coagulation cascade.
