In 1960, Barritt and Jordan1 published a report of a randomized trial demonstrating the mortality benefit of anticoagulation in the treatment of acute pulmonary embolism (PE).The control arm of the study was terminated when 5 of 19 patients in that arm died of recurrent PE and 5 additional patients experienced recurrent nonfatal PE. Of 54 patients treated with anticoagulants, 1 experienced recurrent nonfatal PE, and 2 died from other causes—1 from bleeding. Patients in both arms stayed in the hospital at least 10 days during mandated bed rest. Only 1 of the 7 deaths occurred within the first week after diagnosis.