Myocardial Infarction: Heart Attack

A Myocardial Infarction (MI) also known as a heart attack is a serious condition where the supply of blood to the heart is suddenly blocked.
It needs to be treated as quickly as possible.
Symptoms of a heart attack include chest pain, shortness of breath, dizziness and sweating. Call 999 if you think someone is having an MI
An MI needs to be treated in hospital as quickly as possible. Medicine or surgery may be needed to restore the supply of blood to your heart.
In the UK around 100,000 hospital admissions each year are due to heart attacks; that's 290 admissions each day or one every five minutes. In the 1960s more than seven out of ten heart attacks in the UK were fatal. Today more than seven out of ten people survive.
Paramedics usually do an electrocardiogram (ECG) to check the heart's electrical activity and find out if the signs and symptoms are due to an MI. Depending on what the rhythm looks like, and the signs and symptoms described by the patient, paramedics may make a preliminary diagnosis of an MI.
A troponin blood test measures the levels of troponin T or troponin I proteins in the blood. These proteins are released when the heart muscle has been damaged, such as occurs with an MI. The more damage there is to the heart, the greater the amount of troponin T and I there will be in the blood.
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