Albert Ferro • David A. Garcia
Editors
2013
Drugs used to prevent and treat thrombotic diseases are amongst the most widely used in clinical medicine. Aspirin, once used principally for its anti-in fl ammatory and analgesic actions, is now predominantly used as an anti-platelet agent. Despite the fact that it was one of the fi rst drugs to come into common usage, having been developed by Felix Hoffmann in 1897 and subsequently marketed by Bayer, aspirin remains the most widely used drug in the world. Warfarin was originally developed and used as a rodenticide, and in 1954 was approved for medical use in humans; since then, warfarin and related coumarin derivatives have been the only orally active anticoagulant drugs available to the physician.