Why You Need TXA as Much as Your Seat Belt

by Te-Ping Chen · 2010-06-17 08:16:00 UTC
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When someone perishes in a car crash — as happened in the case of Zenani Mandela's fatal accident this week — any number of "what if's" besiege the mind: What if the driver hadn't been drinking? What if they hadn't taken that road?

For most people, the question, What if they'd had tranexamic acid? doesn't enter the equation. But as a new report finds, it absolutely should. For people between ages 5 and 45, the AP reports, accidents are the second-leading cause of death after AIDS. In fact, nearly 6 million people die from injuries every year — more than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis put together.

Many of these deaths result from simple hemorrhage, or excessive bleeding, which causes about one-third of trauma deaths in hospitals. If you could reduce those cases, you'd save hundreds of thousands of lives.

That's where tranexamic acid (TXA) comes in. According to a new study published in the Lancet this week, which examined over 10,000 adult trauma patients in 40 countries, accident victims who received TXA had a 15% lower chance of hemorrhage than those who received only a placebo. Their chances of dying from other causes as well (including head injuries or organ failure) also diminished by 10%.

What's more, TXA is off-patent. It's accessible, costing just about $9 per dose. "This is one of the cheapest ways ever to save a life," says Ian Roberts of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Though TXA has previously been studied for use in elective surgeries, this study marks the first time the drug has been examined for use on accident victims. Roberts — a lead investigator in the study — estimates that if TXA were made widely available, it could save up to 100,000 lives a year. The impact for developing countries like India and China, where the overwhelming majority of injury-related deaths (90%) occur, would be particularly meaningful.

It's an exciting finding, one that should be heeded not only in developing countries, but in the West. TXA might not be as well-known as road-safety measures like seatbelts or drunk-driving laws — but as researchers suggest, it absolutely should be.

Photo Credit: webhamster

Te-Ping Chen Te-Ping Chen is a freelance writer and U.S. Truman Scholar whose writing has appeared in the Nation Magazine, the South China Morning Post magazine, Le Soir, and Slate.com.
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