OBJECTIVES This study investigated early electrocardiographic findings in relation to left ventricular (LV) function, extent and size of infarction, and microvascular injury in patients with acute myocardial infarction (MI) treated with percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). BACKGROUND The electrocardiogram (ECG) is the most used and simplest clinical method to evaluate the risk for patien...

Patients who have symptoms suspicious for an acute coronary syndrome (ACS) should be evaluated as soon as possible after symptom onset if for no other reason than to identify those with ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) who can benefit from timely reperfusion therapy. In our society, we expect that all patients, regardless of individual characteristics (eg, age, gender, race, socioecon...

27 Received October 24, 2016; revised and accepted April 13, 2017. Published online May 12, 2017; doi: 10.1620/tjem.242.27. Correspondence: Bang-Ning Wang, Department of Cardiology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, No. 218 Jixi Road, Hefei, Anhui Province 230022, P.R. China. e-mail: [email protected] Prognostic Factors for In-Hospital and Long-Term Survival i...

INTRODUCTION The study was designed to reduce door-to-balloon times in primary percutaneous coronary intervention for patients presenting to the Emergency Department with acute ST-elevation myocardial infarction, using an audit as a quality initiative. MATERIALS AND METHODS A multidisciplinary work group performed a pilot study over 3 months, then implemented various process and work-flow str...

The contemporary management of patients with acute ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) in the United States has focused upon increasing the timely access to primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) through nationwide quality improvement efforts and the establishment of regional STEMI systems of care across the country (1,2). Nonetheless, because only one-third of the appr...

We describe a case of a 68-year-old man with known ischaemic heart disease, who passed out after nitroglycerine administration. He had triple-vessel ischaemic heart disease and had suffered from myocardial infarction about 17 years prior to this incident. An ECG revealed ST-segment elevation in the anterior leads. The elevations lasted at least 40 minutes and no longer than 60 minutes. No tropo...

BACKGROUND Distal embolization during primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) for ST-elevation myocardial infarction may result in reduced myocardial perfusion, infarct extension, and impaired prognosis. METHODS AND RESULTS In a prospective randomized trial, we studied the effect of routine thrombectomy in 215 patients with ST-segment-elevation myocardial infarction lasting <12 hours...

BACKGROUND Inducible ventricular tachycardia (VT) is a strong predictor of spontaneous ventricular tachyarrhythmia following ST-segment-elevation myocardial infarction. Reduced left ventricular ejection fraction (EF) predisposes patients to inducible VT after ST-segment-elevation myocardial infarction. However, the role of right ventricular (RV) dysfunction in predisposing to inducible VT has n...

BACKGROUND Primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is more effective on average than fibrinolytic therapy in the treatment of ST-segment-elevation myocardial infarction. Yet, most US hospitals are not equipped for PCI, and fibrinolytic therapy is still widely used. This study evaluated the comparative effectiveness of ST-segment-elevation myocardial infarction regionalization strategie...