Vitamin E as blood thinner?

My major form of exercise is a martial art so I am opposed to taking blood thinners because I would have to give it up and that would profoundly effect my quality of life.
I have wondered if vitamin E 400+IU might be used as a blood thinner. Has anyone tried it?
My cardiologist leans more in the direction of ablation or traditional blood thinners.

It's up to you. What risk are you willing to take that a stroke prevents you from even walking....or talking? I would have to do some serious research to find even an approximation of the disparity in risk between a DOAC and any other so-called 'blood thinner.'

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aikidorobbins
My major form of exercise is a martial art so I am opposed to taking blood thinners because I would have to give it up and that would profoundly effect my quality of life.

I'm 69 and very active. I'm on Eliquis, 5mg 2x/day. Rock climbing on sharp rock, I commonly rip the heck out of my arms, also knees and two weeks ago was belaying barefoot on sharp rock. The climber fell and loaded the rope, pulling me off balance and I ripped the skin on my toe pretty good. In all cases got the bleeding stopped though it took a bit longer than it would have without the Eliquis. Then a week or two before that sliced my thumb fairly deeply with a sharp knife chopping veggies. Again took it a while to get it really stopped, but not anything concerning. I alpine ski the steeps hard off pisté above 13,000' treeline with plenty of rocks to fall into, I slackline, I rock climb - same as before Eliquis. Taking Eliquis has not stopped me from doing anything I did before.

Vitamin E has some mild blood thinning properties but I wouldn't in a million years rely on it to protect me from strokes. As gloaming pointed out, stroke will do you far more harm than anything martial arts will ever cause. As I like to remind people, death is not the worst outcome from stroke.

Who told you that you would have to give up martial arts? People really overestimate the dangers of anticoagulants. Do you routinely take blows to the head sufficient to cause concussion, "seeing stars" or lasting headache? My wife holds a black belt in Tang Soo Do karate and she never has. If you do take regular blows like that then I would agree that you should stop the martial arts or switch to less violent forms. And I would say that even if you weren't on Eliquis because repetitive traumatic brain injury comes with its own set of very bad things. But if such blows don't routinely occur then I don't see any reason you need to stop the martial arts.

To add to George's comments, I've been on Eliquis for years and I'm an avid cyclist (road) and I've never given it up despite the obvious risks of 50 mph downhills. I just wear a helmet religiously.

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aikidorobbins
My major form of exercise is a martial art so I am opposed to taking blood thinners because I would have to give it up and that would profoundly effect my quality of life.
I have wondered if vitamin E 400+IU might be used as a blood thinner. Has anyone tried it?
My cardiologist leans more in the direction of ablation or traditional blood thinners.

You would have a worst quality of life if you had a stroke. I stumble and fell a lot. Bruises all over. They don’t bother me . A bruise isn’t as bad as possibly becoming handicapped from a major stroke. My father had 12 strokes and became a vegetable. My brother had about 5. I saw their quality of life decline. My father was once an athlete in the minors (baseball) and emotionally his handicap affected him as well.

Thanks to all of you who replied to my inquiry. Your comments are extremely helpful and I will definitely rethink taking a blood thinner. When I take Aikido classes I usually get a bit bruised but have never been hit in the head which is my biggest concern if I take a blood thinner.
I have taken your very knowledgeable comments to HEART.

How about sparring headgear? Like Carey, I wear a helmet for most activities. I also have a genetic predisposition to Alzheimers & those genetics also make it harder for my brain to recover from head injury. I definitely pay attention to that risk (I played US football in college and am lucky I didn't get brain damage from that).

If it were me, I'd take the thinner and carry some sort of product like this -- made to stop moderate to severe bleeding:

[www.amazon.com]

So you fellows say skiing is OK? My cardiologist told me no skiing and I might find it hard to get insurance. Only had one knock in the head region and that was my jaw and knee. That was before helmets. An error of judgement last week and I came off my mountain bike. Flies enjoyed my bloodied knee but it stopped fairly quickly. Not hijacking the thread I hope. I suppose martial arts could be an issue but if you don't get hit in the head all good. If you do get a particularly bad blow go straight to emergency. I still don't know how severe a head knock has to be to go to emergency. I bought a foil board a couple or years ago and decided to stop learning as a carbon blade (the foil) flipping up and slicing me while hundreds of meters off the beach might be a problem. For you it is just bruising I presume. You don't need a stroke.

Steven, what we're saying is that if you undertake corrective or remedial measures so that you can live, what good is sitting in a chair watching TV so that one's risk of bleeding is minimal? Is that living? Some would emphatically agree that it is. Others would want to do martial arts, cycle, or ski.

Why did your cardiologist say no skiing? What does she think the danger is? You can flail and fall out of bed in the middle of the night during a nightmare. You WILL cut yourself slicing carrots or green beans. You just don't know when the next time will be. But, if you enjoy green beans....................................

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gloaming
Others would want to do martial arts, cycle, or ski.

True. There are also risk levels within all of these activities. For example, I avoid large or inverted aerials while skiing (or skiing fast through the trees). I also avoid large whippers while leading in rock climbing & so on.

One of my climbing partners is a neurologist. We've had blood thinner discussions. He does allow that warfarin has a materially higher bleed risk (likely because it is easy to get a too high INR) than the newer OACs meds.