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A retrospective cohort study published in Vascular Medicine examined the relationship between pulmonary vascular obstruction and the risk of recurrent venous thromboembolic events (VTE) after discontinuing anticoagulation in patients with unprovoked pulmonary embolism (PE). The study found that an initial pulmonary vascular obstruction index (PVOI) of 40% or higher on computed tomography pulmonary angiograms (CTPA) independently predicted an increased risk of recurrent VTE after stopping anticoagulation. The study also found that men with a PVOI of 40% or higher had a significantly higher 5-year recurrence risk. However, the study concluded that the recurrence rate in this group was still too high to solely guide the decision to discontinue anticoagulant treatment. Further research is needed to determine if incorporating PVOI into existing scoring systems can improve recurrence risk stratification. [Extracted from the article]