If you are due to have surgery and you are taking warfarin, you should talk to your doctor to plan the best way to manage your warfarin treatment.
Your doctor will need to consider the benefits versus the risks of stopping your warfarin.
If your doctor believes that you have a low risk of developing a blood clot at the time of surgery, you may be advised to stop your warfarin for a few days before surgery and asked to restart immediately after surgery.
If your doctor believes that you have a high risk of developing a blood clot you may be changed from warfarin to low molecular weight heparin a few days before surgery. You may also require heparin after surgery. In some cases you may need to come into hospital before your surgery.
- You will need close monitoring around the time of surgery
- If your INR result is in the range 2-3 it usually takes about 4 days for the INR to fall to 1.5 or less.
- Most surgery can be safely performed with an INR of less than 1.5.
- After restarting warfarin it usually takes 3 days for the INR to return to the correct treatment range.