Adrian J Stanley, Sheila Dickson, Peter C Hayes, Ewan H Forrest, Peter R Mills, Dhiraj Tripathi, Joanna A Leithead, Kim MacBeth, Lyn Smith, Daniel R Gaya, Harry Suzuki, David Young
BACKGROUND & AIMS: Rebleeding after an initial oesophageal variceal haemorrhage remains a significant problem despite therapy with band ligation, non-selective β-blockers or a combination of these. Carvedilol is a vasodilating non-selective β-blocker with alpha-1 receptor and calcium channel antagonism. A recent study has suggested it is effective in the prevention of a first variceal bleed. Our aim was to compare oral carvedilol with variceal band ligation (VBL) in the prevention of rebleeding following a first variceal bleed...
November 2014: Journal of Hepatology