Abstract:

Objective: The incidence of upper limb deep vein thrombosis is rising in parallel with more frequent invasive vascular procedures. In this study we aimed to evaluate the upper limb deep vein thrombosis (ULDVT) cases retrospectively according to risk factors, symptoms, diagnosis and clinical course.Methods: Between January 2012 and May 2014, we studied 23 deep vein thrombosis cases which were confirmed with Doppler ultrasound. The patients were questioned about risk factors and underlying diseases and were examined with upper extremity venous Doppler ultrasonography. 15 cases had (65.2%) central venous catheter being the most common ULDVT reason.Results: Protocol included low molecular weight heparin in the acute phase and then oral anticoagulant for 6 months. All patients were followed at outpatient clinic with 2 month intervals for a year. Before completing the followup, 5 patients (21.7%) died of other reasons and we didn’t see any pulmonary embolus complication and recurrent DVT. None of the cases had post-thrombotic syndrome during follow-up.Conclusion: We suggest that LMWH must be preferred to standard heparin therapy because of its effectiveness, rare hemorrhage risk and easy usage to relieve symptoms, prevent recurrences, shorten the therapy period and decrease the costs

Keywords: