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Widely available, cost effective drug could save hundreds of thousands of brain injury patients’ liv

15/10/2019

A cost effective and widely available drug could help save hundreds of thousands of lives each year if it was given to patients brought into hospitals with head injuries, a new study has found. The drug, tranexamic acid, helps stop bleeding in and around the brain, arresting damage that can occur post-trauma. It’s already approved for clinical use and is routinely taken to prevent internal bleeding in other parts of the body following trauma, as well as women with dangerous bleeding after childbirth. According to the study published in The Lancet, if given early enough, tranexamic acid can improve patient survival rates. While it cannot reverse trauma damage, it can prevent a small bleed becoming worse. The team from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) tested tranexamic acid on almost 13,000 patients. They found that if given within three hours of a head trauma, the number of fatalities was reduced by as much as 20%. Furthermore, tranexamic acid is a cost effective treatment, with a course in the UK costing around £6.20 (7.09 euros) per patient. Speaking about the findings of the trial, one of the lead investigators, Prof Haleema Shakur, from the LSHTM, said: “The results are just amazing. It's the first trial to ever show that a [medical] treatment can reduce the risk of traumatic brain injury patients dying. “This is the first time that we have seen a beneficial effect. It will have huge implications worldwide. “It's a widely available drug, it's relatively cheap and it's really simple to give.”

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