My mother became very anemic on 8 tablets of full strength Ecotrin and 5 milligrams of prednisone daily after some genius decided she had polymyalgia rheumatica, but you need to monitor kidney function with periodic blood chemistry testing too, IMHO.
Ecotrin is essentially enteric coated aspirin so the tablet passes through the stomach before dissolving in the small intestine. Better for the stomach, but still quite capable of causing bleeding in the intestinal tract. I'm surprised there wasn't additional symptoms like ringing ears at that dosage.
There are some studies that suggest the heart benefits from aspirin are really a consequence of reducing the iron load in the body from the induced bleeding rather than the specific impact on prostaglandin production.
Aspirin inactivates both the good COX-1 and the bad COX-2. Unfortunately, COX-1 inhibition is the cause of stomach lesions and renal toxicity. COX-2 inhibition breaks the synthesis chain for substances that cause inflammation. The "ideal" approach would only block COX-2, but even that has proven to have bad side effects.