Review of the Fifth American College of Chest Physicians Consensus Conference on Antithrombotic Therapy: outpatient management for adults.

The recommendations of the Fifth American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) Consensus Conference on Antithrombotic Therapy are reviewed, with a focus on outpatient anticoagulation management in adults. Numerous therapeutic recommendations have changed since the Fourth ACCP Consensus Conference on Antithrombotic Therapy. The system of grading recommendations has been modified to emphasize clinically important differences and to take into account the benefit-risk ratio of each treatment option. The International Normalized Ratio (INR) goal is now expressed as a specific target value within a range rather than simply an INR range. The recommendations of the fifth conference cover initiation of warfarin therapy, hemorrhagic complications, management of excessive anticoagulation, interruption of warfarin therapy for patients requiring surgery, nonvalvular atrial fibrillation, cardioversion in patients with atrial fibrillation, valvular heart disease, mechanical and biological prosthetic heart valves, coronary artery disease, saphenous vein and internal mammary artery bypass grafts, peripheral arterial occlusive disease, prevention of venous thromboembolism, treatment of venous thromboembolism, stroke prevention in patients with cerebrovascular disease, and pregnancy. Since the fourth consensus conference, new anticoagulation therapies and indications have emerged; the recommendations of the Fifth ACCP Consensus Conference on Antithrombotic Therapy have provided practitioners with a resource of immense value.