This study is very interesting, but the results do not prove that aspirin (ASA) is not beneficial in primary prevention of cardiovascular events in all patients with diabetes.
Only patients of Scottish descent were studied, so the results are not generalizable. Only patients with asymptomatic peripheral arterial disease (PAD) were studied, so the results are not generalizable. Invetsigators did not measure levels of plasminogen activator inhibitor 1 (PAI-1), the key protein that causes 'sticky platelets' (abnormal formation of platelet clots) in patients with (especially type 2) diabetes, so it may very well be that a subset of patients with higher PAI-1 levels did benefit from ASA therapy (by way of analogy, if 1200 random people are given metformin - Glucophage - there may be no reduced risk of heart attack for the entire group as a whole, whereas the 80 or so patients who in fact have T2DM within the whole group will have a significant reduction in heart attack rate that is 'masked' by the higher number of non-diabetic, non-repsonders). It's also worth noting that the antioxidant supplement employed was woefully inadequate in this study.
You are right that 'one size does not fit all patients,' but neither should one study of one population convince us that any given therapy is of no value. That is simply not the way science works.
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I used to take aspirin because my doctor told me to. Everytime I cut myself or my nose gets a little dry, it's hard to stop the bleeding so I figured I might not need the aspirin to thin my blood. My low cholesterol puts me at risk for hemorrhagic stroke and the idea of adding aspirin to that makes me nervous.
You are wiser than your doctor. Sounds like he or she practices "one size fits all" medicine.
David
We hear a lot about the positive blood-thinning effects of aspirin and none of the negative effects. As you implied, aspirin is a very strong drug that has a lot of other more negative effects and is hard, not only on the stomach but also on many other organs and NERVES. As for blood thinning-
there many other more natural and milder agents such as Omega 3 fats. I seem to get an allergic type reaction from it. Bravo for bringing out a more balanced view!