Optimal Duration of Anticoagulation Therapy for Low-risk Pulmonary Embolism Patients with Cancer

Venous thromboembolism (VTE), including pulmonary embolism (PE) and deep vein thrombosis (DVT), is a major health problem in the world. There have been many clinical studies evaluating VTE, although data on low-risk PE, including incidental PE and asymptomatic PE has been quite limited. However, low-risk PE was reported to account for a large proportion of all the diagnoses of PE detected on computed tomography in daily clinical practice, and optimal management strategies for these patients are becoming clinically more relevant. The current American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) guidelines weakly suggest the same approach for low-risk PE patients with cancer as other PE patients with cancer. However, whether anticoagulation therapy should be continued indefinitely remains uncertain and the duration of treatment in these patients might vary widely in daily clinical practice. Recently, some observational studies reported that low-risk patients with cancer have a high risk of VTE recurrence, suggesting the benefit of prolonged anticoagulation therapy. In this open-label, superiority trial, the investigators randomly assign low-risk PE patients with active cancer to receive either rivaroxaban for 6 months (short DOAC group) or rivaroxaban for 18 months (long DOAC group).