ultra-fi ltration assay in early diagnosis of acute coronary syndrome

INTRODUCTION Patients with acute chest pain remain a great diagnostic challenge to emergency physicians. It is estimated that 30% of patients presenting with chest pain will be diagnosed with an acute coronary syndrome. [1] However, none of the traditional clinical data, 12-lead ECG, biochemical markers of necrosis, or imaging techniques can be considered a true gold standard for the diagnosis of cardiac ischemia. Ischemia-modified albumin (IMA) is a recently developed biomarker of transient myocardial ischemia. Previous studies have shown that IMA levels rise within minutes after cardiac ischemia. [2] IMA is a serum albumin in which the N-terminus has been chemically modified. The diagnostic albumin CO2 + binding (ACB) test for IMA is based on the observation that the affi nity of serum albumin for CO2 + is reduced after N-terminus modifications. The test has already been licensed by the US Food and Drug Administration for diagnosis of suspected myocardial ischemia. [3]