of Studies With VKA With Dabi mg With VKA With Dabigatran CI) Quality of Evidence Burden of treatment (important outcome) N/A No serious limitations No serious limitations No serious limitations No serious limitations N/A N/A N/A VKA . dabigatran Warfarin: daily medication, lifestyle limitations, dietary restrictions, frequent blood testing and clinic visits High Dabigatran: daily medication only Dabi dabigatran. See Table legends for expansion of other abbreviations. a The CI does not exclude the possibility of no effect. b Based on data from Go et al, which reported a mortality rate of per person-y in untreated (no warfarin) patients from an observational study (ATRIA cohort) and an estimated relative risk of mortality of for VKA vs no therapy ( Table ). c Intracranial hemorrhage includes intracerebral, subdural, and subarachnoid bleeds. The published report did not provide the number of strokes that were fatal and nonfatal; therefore, we imputed values for the number of fatal and nonfatal strokes to estimate the relative risk for nonfatal stroke. Assumptions underlying these estimates are detailed in section of this article. d Of the nonfatal strokes on VKA therapy, an estimated were ischemic, and were hemorrhagic. e Of the nonfatal strokes on dabigatran therapy, an estimated were ischemic, and were hemorrhagic. f We estimated the annual rates of nonfatal stroke (ischemic and hemorrhagic) on warfarin by extrapolating from observed annual rates of ischemic stroke (fatal nonfatal), strati ed by CHADS score, in the aspirin arms of six historical RCTs in patients with AF (Gage et al ). Assumptions underlying these estimates are detailed in section of this article. 