Definition for Warfarin
From Biology Forums Dictionary
Warfarin (also known under the brand names Coumadin, Jantoven, Marevan, Lawarin, Waran, and Warfant) is an anticoagulant. While it may be one of many drugs popularly referred to as a "blood thinner" , this is a misnomer, since it does not affect the thickness or viscosity of blood. Instead, it acts on the liver to decrease the quantity of a few key proteins in blood that normally allow blood to clot.
Warfarin was initially introduced in 1948 as a pesticide against rats and mice and is still popular for this purpose, although more potent poisons such as brodifacoum have since been developed. In the early 1950s warfarin was found to be effective and relatively safe for preventing thrombosis and embolism (abnormal formation and migration of blood clots) in many disorders. It was approved for use as a medication in 1954 and has remained popular ever since; warfarin is the most widely prescribed oral anticoagulant drug in North America.
Despite its effectiveness, treatment with warfarin has several shortcomings. Many commonly used medications interact with warfarin, as do some foods (particularly fresh plant-based foods containing vitamin K) and its activity has to be monitored by blood testing for the international normalized ratio (INR) to ensure an adequate yet safe dose is taken. A high INR predisposes to a high risk of bleeding, while an INR below the therapeutic target indicates that the dose of warfarin is insufficient to protect against thromboembolic events.
Warfarin and related 4-hydroxycoumarin-containing molecules decrease blood coagulation by inhibiting vitamin K epoxide reductase, an enzyme that recycles oxidized vitamin K to its reduced form after it has participated in the carboxylation of several blood coagulation proteins, mainly prothrombin and factor VII. For this reason, drugs in this class are also referred to as vitamin K antagonists. When administered, these drugs do not anticoagulate blood immediately. Instead, onset of their effect requires about a day before clotting factors being normally made by the liver have time to naturally disappear in metabolism, and the duration of action of a single dose of warfarin is 2 to 5 days. Under normal pharmacological therapy the drugs are administered to decrease the action of the clotting factors they affect by 30 to 50%.
Warfarin is a synthetic derivative of dicoumarol, a 4-hydroxycoumarin-derived mycotoxin anticoagulant originally discovered in spoiled sweet clover-based animal feeds. Dicoumarol, in turn, is derived from coumarin, a sweet-smelling but coagulation-inactive chemical found naturally in "sweet" clover (to which it gives its odor and name) and many other plants. The name warfarin stems from its discovery at the University of Wisconsin, incorporating the acronym for the organization which funded the key research (WARF, for Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation) and the ending -arin, indicating its link with coumarin.