New heart attack test ‘could save many lives’
A large clinical trial on the effectiveness of the test is currently under way in Scotland which it is hoped will confirm earlier research showing heart attacks could be diagnosed in twice as many women using the sensitive troponin test.
The test is thought to be able to detect lower levels of troponin, a protein that leaks into the blood from heart muscle cells after they have been damaged by a heart attack, than the one currently used by the NHS.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide AdDoctors measure troponin to see if a heart attack is the reason why somebody is suffering chest pains.
It is thought the new test is particularly effective in picking up cases in women, because they appear to have lower troponin levels than men.
CONNECT WITH THE SCOTSMAN
• Subscribe to our daily newsletter (requires registration) and get the latest news, sport and business headlines delivered to your inbox every morning
Professor Peter Weissberg, medical director at the British Heart Foundation, which is funding the research at the University of Edinburgh, said the results could prove significant.
“If these results are confirmed in the much larger clinical trial we’re funding, these results suggest that using a high sensitivity troponin test, with a threshold specific to each gender, could save many more women’s lives by identifying them earlier to take steps to prevent them dying or having another, bigger heart attack,” he said.
Research involving 1,126 patients showed promising results when it was published three years ago.
University of Edinburgh clinical research fellow Dr Anoop Shah told the BBC: “For some reason, women are less likely to have obvious symptoms and if the test result comes back negative then they might be sent home only to have an event [heart attack] in the next few months because they were not treated appropriately.”
Edinburgh woman Jenni Stevens said she is grateful that her heart attack, which she had thought was just chest pain, was detected using the sensitive test.
SCOTSMAN TABLET AND IPHONE APPS