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Nov. 26, 2003
Aspirin: How Much Is Too Much?
Aspirin: How Much Is Too Much? Creating an In-vitro Model to Determine Minimum Daily Aspirin Dosage
Justin Koh, 13, Bakersfield, Calif.
Travel Channel "Dream Science Trip" Award
Project background: In an effort to thin their blood and prevent heart attacks, Justin’s father and grandmother take daily doses of aspirin. However, as a side effect, both of them suffer stomach ailments. Justin was concerned that their daily dosage of aspirin was too high, but when he tried to find out how much they should be taking, he got many conflicting answers. This led him to try to figure out what the minimum daily aspirin dosage is for anticoagulant purposes.
Tactics and results: Eight vials of blood were drawn from 11 subjects by his father, an oral surgeon. Each vial was then treated with eight different amounts of aspirin, equivalent to daily doses ranging from 0 to 80 milligrams. Justin then put the samples in a machine to measure platelet aggregation. This allowed him to design an "in vitro" model that accurately quantifies aspirin’s effect on platelets and determine the minimum dosage for each of the 11 subjects.
Justin concluded that there is no single minimum daily aspirin dosage that is right for everyone.
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