Hi, I am a final-year PhD student at King's College London. Our research team at King’s College Hospital is seeking breastfeeding mothers for a research study aiming to find out whether oral blood thinning medications pass into human breast milk.
The risk of developing blood clots in the body is increased in women following the birth of a baby. So mothers who are at high risk of getting these clots or already have these clots are given blood thinning medications for at least 7 days after delivery and sometimes for up to 6 weeks.
Currently, only the traditional blood thinning medicines (heparin and warfarin) can be prescribed to breastfeeding mothers as they are known to be safe during breastfeeding period. Many women find these medicines inconvenient, because they are required to inject heparin themselves at home or attend the clinic frequently for the monitoring of warfarin. In recent years, new blood thinning drugs, such as apixaban and rivaroxaban, have become available in the UK. They can be taken as tablets and require no monitoring. However, it is not known whether these drugs pass into human breast milk.
The purpose of our research study is to investigate whether apixaban or rivaroxaban pass into human breast milk, which will help to find out if these drugs could be used instead of heparin injections or warfarin for breastfeeding mothers.
You may be eligible to participate if you:
• Are breastfeeding currently and planning to switch your baby to solids, or
• Stopped breastfeeding but are still expressing breastmilk
Study participation involves:
• 1 visit to King’s College Hospital for eligibility screening
• Taking a single dose of the blood thinning medication
• Providing breastmilk and bloods samples, once you have taken the dose of the blood thinning medication over a 24 hour period
As a way of thanks for participation in the study, you will receive £350. We still need one or two more mothers to join our study. Your help will be greatly appreciated!
For more information please contact: [email protected] 