This “study provides the first evidence” that using a single blood test is safe and finds vulnerable people who are going to have “a heart attack within 30 days”.

Researchers at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) have developed a way of detecting the danger of a heart attack among Indigenous patients more quickly, which could expedite their treatment and reduce hospital crowding.

Researchers at QUT have found a way to find out more quickly if an Indigenous patient is likely to have a heart attack. This could speed up their treatment and make hospitals less crowded.

According to a QUT study, a single test result could be used to safely rule out a heart attack in up to one-third of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander individuals with low troponin levels.

QUT Associate Professor Jaimi Greenslade from the Australian Centre for Health Services Innovation (AusHSI) reviewed data from 110 patients who attended the Cairns Hospital emergency room with chest pain, according to a study published today in the Medical Journal of Australia.

Professor Greenslade explained that the current method for detecting a heart attack was to check for troponin levels, a protein released into the bloodstream by injured heart muscles, at the time of the patient’s presentation and again 2-3 hours later.

“There is a growing body of evidence reporting that a single test may be adequate to rule out heart attack for a group of non-Indigenous patients,” said Professor Greenslade, “but limited research has evaluated the use of a single test for Indigenous patients.”

“Our study provides the first evidence that using a single test is likely to be as safe for Indigenous patients as non-Indigenous patients.”

“We found that of the patients who had very low troponin levels on presentation, none ended up having a heart attack within 30 days.”

Professor Greenslade said Indigenous people had a higher baseline risk of heart attack than non-Indigenous patients, therefore researchers wanted to make sure testing was safe for this group.

“The traditional process used to assess for heart attack ends up being quite lengthy and there are large numbers of patients presenting to emergency departments with chest pain every year, contributing to overcrowding.”

“A considerable amount of research has looked at whether there is a way to expedite this process.

“One finding was that patients with extremely low results on the first blood test were unlikely to have heart attack and might not need the second test or further testing.”

“Until now, it hasn’t been clear whether a low initial test result in an Indigenous patient was enough to rule out heart attack like it is in the non-Indigenous patient.”

“The implications are that a group of Indigenous patients might also be able to be discharged earlier and may not require long hospital stays.”

According to the study, a substantial percentage of individuals had cardiovascular disease risk factors, including 66 percent who were smokers, 40 percent who had diabetes, 56 percent who had hypertension, and 57 percent who had a family history of coronary artery disease.

“A low troponin value may safely exclude heart attack,” Professor Greenslade said, “but Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people may benefit from referral to culturally appropriate medical services for cardiac risk factor management.”

According to Professor Greenslade, further research on bigger cohorts across several sites is necessary before the findings can be incorporated into clinical practice, as the observational study was rather small.

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