As medications go, aspirin is often considered a wonder drug. Its pain-relieving, inflammation-taming powers can treat headaches, minor aches and pains and even lower the risk of heart disease, stroke and possibly even dementia.
But all of those benefits may come at a price, according to the latest study to analyse aspirin’s risks and benefits, especially for people who take the drug as a way to prevent having a first heart event. In a study published in JAMA, researchers led by Dr. Sean Zheng at King’s College London found that the risks of aspirin — primarily of bleeding in the stomach and intestinal tract — are about equal to the benefits the drug may provide in lowering risk of heart events in people who have not had heart problems.
In other words, when it comes to weighing the heart-health benefits of aspirin to its gastrointestinal risks in this population, for most people, it’s a wash.
Researchers have long known that popping aspirin comes with a risk of bleeding, but the new study directly compares that risk to the benefits. They looked at data from more than 160,000 people ages 53 to 74 who had not experienced heart events. (Some did have risk factors for developing them, however.) Those who took a daily low-dose aspirin lowered their risk of dying from heart disease, having a heart attack or stroke by 11% compared to people who did not take aspirin — a 38% drop in absolute risk for heart events. But people who took aspirin also had a 43% higher risk of a major bleeding event compared to those not taking the drug, equalling a 47% jump in absolute risk. That suggests that the risks may not outweigh the benefits for healthy people, which raises the question of when, and even if, people without heart trouble should be taking aspirin at all. Read more
