Hi, Sundance (@sundance6). Not to give you any advice, but to share my experience with Coumadin. When I was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation four years ago, my cardiologist (not my neurologist) prescribed Warfarin (Coumadin) in modest doses of 5-7.5mg daily. Almost 3 years later (June 2018) I suffered a "small stroke", probably from a blood clot that formed in my heart after an anomaly in the ability of the Coumadin to prevent clotting. A lab test showed a very low anticoagulation in my blood. However, that occurred only once since I started taking Coumadin and has not recurred since my stroke last year.

Note that Coumadin was prescribed for me in order to prevent a stroke, not after I already had one. That sounds more like advertising for Eliquis which suggests that it's good at preventing "another stroke." One reason my medical team and I have stayed with Coumadin is that an antidote is readily available, if needed when bleeding starts as a result of an accident of some sort. My pharmacist suggested that I switch to one of the other anticoagulants, but he could not guarantee that antidotes were regularly available for those other drugs, so we turned them down and I remain on Coumadin. Lab tests every two or three months reassure me that Warfarin is doing the job of avoiding clots forming in my heart.

Hope this information is useful to you and gives you some questions to pose for your medical team about your need for an anticoagulant medication --- and which one. Martin