Ulcerative Colitis (UC) and Blood Clots: Can Anticoagulant Medications Help?
UC may increase your likelihood of forming a blood clot. Talk with your doctor about the potential risks and benefits of anticoagulant medications.
Some people with ulcerative colitis experience hypercoagulability, which means their risk for blood clots is increased.
Learn more about the connection between these two conditions and whether anticoagulant medications are a beneficial treatment for this possible effect.
Does ulcerative colitis cause bleeding or blood clots?
People with ulcerative colitis are three times more likely to experience a thromboembolism (blood clot) compared with those who don't have ulcerative colitis.
It's important to remember that blood clotting is your body's natural response to bleeding. You need your blood to clot so you won't bleed excessively. It's important to keep a balance of blood clotting factors so they won't cause you to form a blood clot when you don't need to.
Symptoms of blood clots with UC
Doctors first connected an increased risk of blood clots with ulcerative colitis when they observed young people experiencing blood clots at a younger-than-expected age. If you have ulcerative colitis, it's important to be aware of your increased clotting risk, but also to know the incidence of a clot is about 1% to 8% of all people with ulcerative colitis.
Blood clots can cause a venous thromboembolism, which is a clot that usually forms in a deep vein of your leg. Doctors call this deep vein thrombosis (DVT). Symptoms of a DVT include:
discoloration of your leg or red-appearing streaks
leg pain/tenderness
leg swelling
part of your leg feels warm to the touch
However, clots can also travel from your legs to your lungs, which doctors call a pulmonary embolism (PE), or blood clot in the lungs. Symptoms of a PE include:
chest pain that worsens with breathing
feeling dizzy
losing consciousness
rapid heart rate
sudden shortness of breath
very fast breathing
If you experience these or other clot-related symptoms, get emergency medical attention.
What is the safest medication for ulcerative colitis with bleeding?
Clotting requires a multi-step process. Anticoagulant medications target different steps in this process to prevent clots from forming when they aren't supposed to. However, anticoagulant medications may increase your risk of more severe rectal bleeding when you have an ulcerative colitis flare-up.
For this reason, doctors won't usually prescribe anticoagulant medications to you unless you're in an active flare-up (and usually in the hospital), after a surgery, or have already had a blood clot in the past. Each of these instances increases your risk of blood clotting. The most common recommendation if you are in the hospital with active IBD is to go for walks.
A number of anticoagulant medications are available, and which one your doctor prescribes may depend upon how long you're going to take it, your overall health, and even what medications your insurance will cover to help keep your costs low. There's no one medication that's the 'gold standard' of anticoagulation treatment for a patient.
Examples of anticoagulation medications include:
If a doctor does prescribe anticoagulants to you, you can ask how the medication works and why it may be the best option for you.
Living with ulcerative colitis
Getting an ulcerative colitis diagnosis can be understandably life changing. It's important to get help and support so you can manage your condition and live well. Some resources include:
American College of Gastroenterology
Crohn's & Colitis Foundation
Connecting to Cure Crohn's & Colitis
IDB Support Foundation
Bezzy IBD Community
Healthline also has a listing of numerous resources, social media pages, and blogs that can help.
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