The new innovation measures troponin levels in the heart muscle within 3-5 minutes to diagnose an impending heart attack.
Trials are under way in the United States to test a new device designed to accurately and quickly sense whether a cardiac arrest patient has a blocked heart valve and therefore needs urgent treatment, according to New Atlas.
Troponin protein
Cardiologists and emergency physicians at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle are testing the Tropsensor device, which is designed to detect popping troponin levels within 3-5 minutes of being worn on a patient’s wrist.
Troponin, a protein found in heart muscle, appears in the bloodstream when damage to the heart occurs and an artery becomes blocked, signaling an impending heart attack.
Finding this as early as possible in patients who arrived at the emergency room allowed the medical staff to treat this serious condition as quickly as possible.
Current procedures
Currently, this condition is diagnosed through an ECG, which may be inaccurate for those who have gone into cardiac arrest, or by testing blood levels of troponin, which can take time and can cost a patient’s life waiting for results. analysis.
“Early identification of acute coronary artery blockages can allow us to quickly restore blood flow to the heart, improving short- and long-term outcomes for patients with unexplained heart attacks,” said Dr. Graham Nichol, MD, an emergency physician at the University of Washington.
Literally saving lives
Dr. Nicol, who supervised the experiment, added that the device can also be used with patients who go to hospital with chest pain, in order to determine if they have a dangerous blockage in the arteries of the heart.
While cardiac arrest involves an electrical failure that causes the heart to stop, some patients who were resuscitated and taken to hospital suffered a second heart attack due to an artery blockage, which can literally mean that identifying the presence of a blockage in the arteries leads to saving the patient’s life.
Dr. Nicole said that the Tropsensor study is witnessing the current stage of testing the wrist device on 30 patients, and the results will be studied over time, provided that the final results of the experiment will be announced next year.
