The American Heart Association recommends continued use of aspirin for patients who have had heart attacks and strokes, but a recent medical study questions whether aspirin is effective for people who only have some heart health risk factors. Health reporter Kafi Drexel filed the following report.

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"It has been shown to have significant anti-platelet effects. Platelets are really responsible for the development of a clot in the artery, which can actually cause heart attack or stroke," says Dr. Jeffrey Berger of the NYU Langone Medical Center.

A new study published in the latest Journal of the American Medical Association examines whether people who have not had heart disease should consider regularly taking aspirin to prevent heart attack or stroke. Berger wrote a corresponding editorial.

"They looked at 3,300 people who are from Scotland and they measured their ankle brachial index. Ankle brachial index is a ratio of one's blood pressure in their arm to their blood pressure in their ankle," says Berger.

Researchers were measuring whether patients had peripheral artery disease. In the study, aspirin was no more effective than a placebo at preventing heart attacks or strokes among patients with PAD. However, because of the way patients were screened and what seems to be limited risk factors, Berger says more approaches to the study are needed.

"I think this study raises the problem with the amount of data we have," says Berger. "In patients that are high risk, whether it is low ankle brachial index, whether it is high blood pressure, whether it's high lipid values, it's unclear how much of a benefit you will get for being on aspirin therapy. But as your risk increases, your benefit is more pronounced."

Doctors like Berger stress that this study does not question whether aspirin is effective. In fact, aspirin is the most effective drug they have for heart disease patients.

Rather, the study leaves it up to patients who are only at risk of heart disease to weigh the positives and negatives of regularly taking aspirin.

One such patient is Grace Domingo, a registered nurse with a family history of heart disease. But with no history herself, she opted not to use aspirin as a preventive measure.

"I have a history of erosive gastritis, so given that one of the side effects of aspirin is bleeding, I thought I was putting myself at risk for increased bleeding in my stomach," she says.

For now, Domingo's controlling heart disease risk through diet and exercise. Anyone who has questions about taking aspirin regularly should always consult a doctor first.