Hi, Windyshores,

This is especially interesting to me as I only qualify by age, since don't have high blood pressure and am a woman.

May I ask if you are below the cut-off age (I forget what it is)? I'm 76 so I do qualify with that one CHADs2 [sic?] point.

I may be repeating myself, but the arrhythmia specialist I saw at the Cleveland Clinic doctor there assumed I would need to take the blood thinner both because of age and sex. You expressed surprise that he had apparently not heard of the gender write off.

(Or is that guideline gender still somehow controversial?)

If I recall rightly you only get AFIB ~ once a year (albeit with great fanfare - ambulance and heavy duty symptoms). I OTOH get it ~ daily, but with almost no symptoms (slight breathlessness sometimes).

Perhaps that frequency even without symptoms, factored in his recommendation. Certainly, my local cardiologist still feels I need a blood thinner. (Didn't ask him about the weighting of gender in that decision. I will.) To note, though, my overall impression of the local doctor, is that he is "old-fashioned" overall - i.e., follows guidelines that were in place previously. That he's not up to date, to say the least.

Certainly, it wouldn't explain the directives of the Cleveland Clinic doc, who is quite young (to my eyes anyhow). Frighteningly, too, he is considered a world class arrhythmia
specialist! :O

Thank you!