• Frank Bowden

03 August 2011Bacterial infections might move more slowly than heart attacks, writes Frank Bowden in Inside Story, but they can be just as deadly

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“MEDICAL systems around the world respond to certain problems in a stereotypical way. The reason that someone with chest pain triggers an immediate response in an emergency department is that a heart attack can kill you quickly and early intervention reduces the risk of subsequent complications or death. In the 1970s if you survived a heart attack long enough to get to hospital the chance of leaving alive was about 80 per cent, and in the 1980s around 85 per cent. Today the chance of your making it home is about 93 per cent. One of the reasons for the continuing decline in the mortality rate from heart attacks among people admitted to hospital has been the rapidity of the medical response. The quality of a cardiology or emergency department can be gauged by the time it takes to get from the door of the hospital to the catheter laboratory where the patient’s blocked artery can be opened up. A hospital’s reputation can hinge on how quickly it achieves this, and it would be impossible for a doctor not to see a heart attack as an emergency requiring an immediate response…”

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