Abstract
For acute ischemic stroke patients, oral aspirin is highly recommended. In Japanese guidelines, intravenous ozagrel and argatrobane are other choices. Although intravenous heparin is often used for acute stroke patients, its efficacy has not been established. For patients with chronic noncardioembolic ischemic stroke, antiplatelet therapy rather than anticoagulation is recommended to reduce the risk of recurrent stroke and other cardiovascular events. The choice of antiplatelet agents differs among guidelines from Japan, United States, and Europe. Among agents which are in commercial use in Japan, aspirin, clopidogrel, and cilostazol are recommended as the major choices. The combination of aspirin and clopidogrel is not routinely recommended. Recently, observational studies from the Bleeding with Antithrombotic Therapy (BAT) Study group were published which determined the characteristics of bleeding complications in Japanese antithrombotic users.
