Can pharmacogenetics help patients under chronic treatment with coumarin anticoagulants?

Vitamin K antagonists are highly effective antithrombotic drugs. However, appropriate dosing is difficult to establish owing to its narrow therapeutic window as well as widespread inter- and intra-individual variability in dosage. Compared with dosing solely based on clinical information, pharmacogenetics can help improve the therapy with coumarins by decreasing the time to reach a stable dose and reducing the risk of bleeding.