A 15-second emergency room test can determine which patients with chest pain have heart problems and which do not, potentially saving lives by allowing doctors to focus on those in urgent need, according to a study published Monday by the American Heart Association.
In the study, 103 people with chest pain were given routine tests as well as a 15-second scan called a multidetector computed tomography, or MDCT, which enables doctors to see where plaque has built up in coronary arteries, making them narrower and harder.
Detecting plaque is key since its buildup is a telltale sign of acute coronary syndrome, or ACS, an umbrella term for the chest pain associated with heart attacks and angina.
“ACS is rare without plaque, so MDCT results may quickly identify a group of patients that can safely be discharged,” said Udo Hoffmann, lead author of the study and assistant professor of radiology at Harvard Medical School, in a statement.
“It would be a big relief for patients to be quickly told that they don’t have anything wrong with their hearts and they can go home,” said Hoffman.
“This can also save lives by easing the burden of emergency rooms and physicians thereby giving them more time to focus on patients who really have heart problems,” he told Reuters in a phone interview.
Published online in “Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association,” the study examined the cases of 41 women and 62 men, average age 54, who came to the Massachusetts General Hospital emergency room with acute chest pain.
Of these 103 patients, 14 were diagnosed with ACS during hospitalization and all had significant plaque levels according to the MDCT scan.
And of the 41 patients without significant levels of plaque according to the MDCT, none had ACS diagnosed during their hospitalization or subsequent five months.
The study also found that 73 of the patients had no significant narrowing of the coronary arteries and not one of them had ACS.
Test likely to become widespread
“Each year, millions of people seek emergency medical care because of chest pain, the most common symptom of heart attack,” said the Heart Association, which is based in Dallas, in a statement.
“For many, heart attack is the clear diagnosis, but annually more than 6 million people (in the U.S.) are admitted to the hospital because the answer isn’t clear,” it said.
Hoffmann said only a “tiny minority” of emergency rooms in the United States currently had the equipment and expertise to administer the tests but he expected the procedure to become widespread in coming years.
