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Software Helps Doctors Predict Heart Attacks

Posted on: Tuesday, 17 October 2006, 12:01 CDT

Computer software is being developed by an international consortium of researchers to help doctors decide how best to treat patients admitted to hospital with suspected heart attacks.

The consortium, led by the University of Edinburgh, has developed a program that enables doctors to assess the severity of a patient's condition. The new 'risk calculator' is already being used in British hospitals.

Doctors using the new Global Registry of Acute Coronary Events (GRACE) calculator system take data from patients at their bedside, and input it into the specially-devised program. Key facts - such as a patient's age, medical history and blood pressure - are recorded by doctors, as well as information derived from on-the-spot blood samples and kidney tests.

The new patient's statistical profile is then input into a computer and matched with data derived from thousands of other coronary cases. Using the outcomes of these previous cases as a guide, the computer will give an accurate assessment of the new patient's conditions, and recommend possible treatment. The consortium claims that it will be able to predict the likelihood the patient suffering a heart attack, and even their chances of dying in the coming months.

Spotting high risk heart patients quickly can be difficult, but Professor Keith Fox, of the University of Edinburgh, says the new tool will help: "identifying those with threatened heart attack from the very many patients with chest pain is a real clinical challenge, but critically important in guiding emergency and subsequent patient care. Higher risk patients need more intensive medical and interventional treatment."

An international group of cardiologists and statisticians have spent several years producing the GRACE calculator. The statistical model has been developed using data derived from six-year study of more than 40,000 coronary patients worldwide.

Professor Fox adds: "The device has recently been introduced into hospitals, following an additional two-year trial on coronary patients admitted to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. This new risk assessment tool gives doctors a robust way of identifying high risk patients who need specialist treatment."

Source: Datamonitor

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