What is a common treatment for severe vitamin K deficiency?

Vitamin K injections are a common treatment for severe vitamin K deficiency because they directly address the underlying cause of the deficiency. Vitamin K is essential for the synthesis of certain clotting factors in the liver, which are critical for normal blood coagulation. When a patient is significantly deficient in vitamin K, it can lead to an increased risk of bleeding due to impaired clotting factor production.

Administering vitamin K through injection provides a prompt increase in blood levels of vitamin K and helps restore the body's ability to produce clotting factors like prothrombin (factor II) and factors VII, IX, and X. This is particularly important in scenarios such as patients who are on long-term anticoagulant therapy or have malabsorption syndromes affecting vitamin K absorption.

While other treatment options such as prothrombin complex concentrate, plasma transfusions, or factor IX concentrate might be used in certain bleeding scenarios or coagulopathies, they do not address the deficiency itself. They provide factors or plasma that can assist in coagulation, but they do not replenish the vitamin K levels necessary for the synthesis of these factors in the body. Thus, vitamin K injections are the most appropriate direct treatment for managing severe vitamin K deficiency.