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Taking Coumodin After Heart Surgery And Stroke. Found Out Pregnancy. Safe To Go For Abortion?

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Posted on Tue, 19 Mar 2013
Question: My friend had heart surgery and stroke at 30 yrs old just 2 weeks after giving birth. She's been on coumodin ever since (about a year) now. Problem is she just found out she's 4 weeks pregnant.
How safe is it for her to have an abortion now? What abortion procedures would you recomment, if any.
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Answered by Dr. Timothy Raichle (44 minutes later)
Hello, I would be happy to help you with this question.

Your friend is in a very difficult situation. The two basic means of aborting the pregnancy involve medications given orally or vaginally OR a D&C procedure. Given the fact that she is on blood thinners makes this very tricky. She needs a consult visit with an OBGYN. It would seem to me that the most controlled manner that this could be performed would be switching her to heparin, creating a small window where she was off of the heparin, performing the procedure and then immediately re-anticoagulating her. It sounds like her continuing the pregnancy is likely life threatening, so an abortion seems very reasonable. She absolutely needs to see a doctor as soon as possible!

I hope that this helps.
Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar
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Dr. Timothy Raichle

OBGYN

Practicing since :1999

Answered : 1687 Questions

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Taking Coumodin After Heart Surgery And Stroke. Found Out Pregnancy. Safe To Go For Abortion?

Hello, I would be happy to help you with this question.

Your friend is in a very difficult situation. The two basic means of aborting the pregnancy involve medications given orally or vaginally OR a D&C procedure. Given the fact that she is on blood thinners makes this very tricky. She needs a consult visit with an OBGYN. It would seem to me that the most controlled manner that this could be performed would be switching her to heparin, creating a small window where she was off of the heparin, performing the procedure and then immediately re-anticoagulating her. It sounds like her continuing the pregnancy is likely life threatening, so an abortion seems very reasonable. She absolutely needs to see a doctor as soon as possible!

I hope that this helps.