When I had a stroke at age 28, my doctors did some tests and found that I have a fairly common clotting disorder called Factor V Leiden. They told me that this, combined with birth control pills, are what caused me to have the cerebral venous thrombosis (stroke). It didn’t occur to me then to […]
Over the last several years, stories of young women, many of them athletes (here, here), suffering from dangerous and sometimes deadly blood clots have filled the press and academic literature (here, here, here). Often mentioned in passing is the fact that these women were taking hormonal contraceptives at the time of the event. As a mom […]
Pulmonary emboli are notoriously difficult to diagnose clinically, especially in otherwise healthy young women. The early signs include such nondescript symptoms as breathing difficulties, chest or back pain, and fatigue; symptoms that are easily attributable to a host of viral and bacterial infections or other less serious respiratory conditions. As a result, and more often […]
No sooner had we landed than my phone began to convulse with a cacophony of bells and chimes. Most of the notifications were last minute details about the live broadcast that brought me to town. In one voice message, a coworker informed me that the producer cancelled our pre-production dinner meeting because of her migraines. He […]
If you haven’t read Chandler Marrs’ latest article on the safety of medications, take a moment to do so and understand that no medication is, as Marrs puts it, “perfectly safe.” I’m here to reaffirm this harsh pill to swallow (pun intended) through the telling of my own personal experience and the showcasing of research […]
If you’ve read any of my posts, you know that this is one of the questions that pervades my work. Do we really know what we think we know? More often than not, the answer is no. Upon examination, what we hold true falls short. In the field of pharmaceutical medicine, where money plays an […]
I recently began a new project tackling the economics of testing women for clotting disorders prior to receiving prescriptions for hormonal contraception. Hormonal contraception induces chemical blood clotting cascades in all women, and thus, developing blood clots while on hormonal birth control is a very real risk. In women who have genetic clotting disorders, those […]
My experience with blood clots started in 1980 as a 16 year old after Family Planning recommended the pill to me. At the time, I played sport – sailing and ice-hockey, was lean and fit, didn’t drink alcohol nor smoke. I grew up eating mostly home-cooked meals; no junk food or soft drinks.Within 6 months […]