NEW YORK (Dispatches) -- Scientists from the University of Notre Dame and the University of Florida have designed a sensor that could diagnose a heart attack in less than 30 minutes.
At Present , doctors need hours to diagnose a heart attack. Initial results from an echocardiogram can quickly show indications of heart disease, but to confirm a patient is having a heart attack, a blood sample and analysis is required. Those results can take up to eight hours.
By targeting three distinct types of microRNA or miRNA, the newly developed sensor can distinguish between an acute heart attack and a reperfusion -- the restoration of blood flow, or reperfusion injury, and requires less blood than traditional diagnostic methods to do so. The ability to differentiate between someone with inadequate blood supply to an organ and someone with a reperfusion injury is an unmet, clinical need that this sensor addresses.