anticoagulants or not?

[peterled]

Due to hypoglycemia, folowing strong diet and no drug correction, my heart rate dropped and i ve got an arrhythmia and a minor stroke. Now we reduced diabetes drugs and my heart rate is normal again, but my doctors are asking me to stay on anticoagulants, which in turn are doing me internal bleeding under arms, hematoms. what should i do ?

[BobD Volunteer]

Difficult question to answer and one I frankly can't. All I can say is that if you have atrial fibrillation , diabetes and a prior stroke then you are at high risk of another potentially more serious one. You must discuss this more fully with your doctors and see if there is an alternative anti-coagulant that you could be on.

[peterled in reply to BobD]

yes, but after stabilizing blood glucose level, heart rate never dropped below 60 bpm. and thin blood is dangerous too

[BobD Volunteer in reply to peterled]

Heart rate has nothing to do with stroke risk. You have AF so you have a risk plus all the other co-morbities. Your blood is not thinned at all as this is a misnomer for anticoagulation. It is the same viscosity as normal but merely takes slightly longer to clot. If you are bleeding it is due to damage either from bruising or injury or there is a weakness at cellular level causing it. Anticoagulation is about risk management so you need to balance a serious stroke risk against risk of bleeding (HASBLED score). Please do discuss with your medical team.

[CDreamer]

Very difficult to advise, as Bob says - go back to your doctors and discuss in a lot more depth, it is all about risk management and benefit.

[Polski]

Up to one gram of Vitamin C a day should strengthen the capillaries, but check it is ok to take this given your other health problems.