None of the 275 patients
who continued warfarin experienced serious (or major)
bleeding. The mean INR across studies of patients who
continued warfarin was between 1.8 and 3.4 (Table 1),
suggesting that patients were therapeutically anticoagulated
at the time of the dental procedure; therefore, the
observed low rates of bleeding are not likely attributable
to a systematically lower intensity of anticoagulation.
Further, the follow-up period after dental procedures was
at least 6 days for all studies, the time frame during which
most procedure-related bleeding events occur,25 thus reducing
the likelihood that bleeding events were missed.