Underutilization of venous thromboemoblism prophylaxis in medical patients in a tertiary care center.

Background: New recommendations concerning the use of prophylactic anticoagulation for medically ill patients have been in use for some time now. This study aims at assessing how much house-staff in a tertiary care setting are implementing these new recommendations in the hope that through quantitative analysis of the deficiency we would be able to identify areas of weakness.

Methods: About 250 patients were randomly selected from all patients admitted to the American University of Beirut Medical Center (AUBMC) during the year 2005 and stayed more than 48 h.