The impact of pharmacologic prophylaxis for venous thromboembolism in patients undergoing neurosurgical intervention remains uncertain. We reviewed the efficacy and safety of pharmacologic compared with nonpharmacologic thromboprophylaxis in neurosurgical patients. Three databases were searched through April 2018, including those for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and for nonrandomized controlled studies (NRSs). Independent reviewers assessed the certainty of evidence using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach. Seven RCTs and 3 NRSs proved eligible. No studies reported on symptomatic proximal and distal deep vein thrombosis (DVT). Two RCTs reported on screening-detected proximal and distal DVTs. We used the findings of these 2 RCTs as the closest surrogate outcomes to inform the proximal and distal DVT outcomes. These 2 RCTs suggest that pharmacologic thromboprophylaxis may decrease the risk of developing asymptomatic proximal DVT (relative risk [RR], 0.50; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.30-0.84; low certainty). Findings were uncertain for mortality (RR, 1.27; 95% CI, 0.57-2.86; low certainty), symptomatic pulmonary embolism (PE) (RR, 0.84; 95% CI, 0.03-27.42; very low certainty), asymptomatic distal DVT (RR, 0.54; 95% CI, 0.27-1.08; very low certainty), and reoperation (RR, 0.43; 95% CI, 0.06-2.84; very low certainty) outcomes. NRSs also reported uncertain findings for whether pharmacologic prophylaxis affects mortality (RR, 0.72; 95% CI, 0.46-1.13; low certainty) and PE (RR, 0.18; 95% CI, 0.01-3.76). For risk of bleeding, findings were uncertain in both RCTs (RR, 1.57; 95% CI, 0.70-3.50; low certainty) and NRSs (RR, 1.45; 95% CI, 0.30-7.12; very low certainty). In patients undergoing neurosurgical procedures, low certainty of evidence suggests that pharmacologic thromboprophylaxis confers benefit for preventing asymptomatic (screening-detected) proximal DVT with very low certainty regarding its impact on patient-important outcomes.
About The Expert
Juan José Yepes-Nuñez
Anita Rajasekhar
Maryam Rahman
Philipp Dahm
David R Anderson
Luis Enrique Colunga-Lozano
Stephanie Ross
Meha Bhatt
Kelly Estrada Orozco
Federico Popoff
Matthew Ventresca
Angela M Barbara
Sara Balduzzi
Housne Begum
Arnav Agarwal
Wojtek Wiercioch
Robby Nieuwlaat
Gian Paolo Morgano
Holger J Schünemann
References
PubMed