It is generally agreed that the best treatment for heart attack patients is to immediately reperfuse the blocked artery with a stent. But many people live in areas where this strategy, known as primary PCI, is not available within the time frame when it produces the greatest benefit. Previous studies have found good short term outcomes in patients who receive a pharmaco-invasive strategy, in which patients first receive fibrinolytic therapy including a clot-busting drug and then later undergo angiography. Now long-term results from a large real-world study show that this strategy may be an acceptable alternative for some patients when immediate primary PCI is not available.
In a paper published in Circulation, French researchers report the 5 year mortality findings from nearly 1,500 STEMI patients enrolled in the 2005 cohort of FAST-MI (The French Registry on Acute ST-Elevation and Non–ST-Elevation Myocardial Infarction).
…
Click here to read the full post on Forbes.
“Door to balloon” time is a very important factor in the outcome of a cardiovascular incident. With such a small time frame to work with, there are many advancements being developed to improve patient outcomes including clinical trials on new medications and robotic-assisted procedures.
One should be very careful with his diet after the first heart stroke.