Before any dental treatment the patient should provide his or her medical history to the dentist. It is very important for a dentist to know the drugs that patient is taking for other medical problems in his or her body. Before the extraction of tooth or some other oral surgery even as simple as scaling we generally advice the patient to stop blood thinner drugs if he or she is already taking before the procedure. One such drug is clopidogrel. One of my patient is a 35 yr old man who did not inform me in his medical history that he is taking this drug. He needed simple and routine scaling. Non stop bleeding from gum margins was observed soon after scaling which bothered me. When asked again he told that he was taking Tab Deplatt A 150.
Generic name of this drug is Clopidogrel which is used to prevent heart attack and stroke in persons with heart disease generally recent heart attack or stroke or blood circulation disease. It keeps blood vessels open and prevent blood clots after certain procedures such as cardiac stent, bypass surgery or balloon angioplasty. It is always good to keep a list of drugs you are taking and you are allergic to so that you can show it your doctor.