European Study into New POCT System to Rule in/Rule Out Suspected Heart Attack

A four-year European study is underway evaluating the clinical benefit of a new point of care testing system to help diagnose suspected heart attack, already the largest cause of death in the EU. Initial findings will be presented at a laboratory symposium on Monday June 22, at the IFCC-EFLM EuroMedLab 2015 being held in the Paris Palais des Congrès, France.

The Lab2Go POCT project is co-funded by the European Commission’s ICT Policy Support Programme to encourage the development of innovative information and communications technologies. One such development, the Philips Minicare Acute point-of-care testing system, is being designed for use in the emergency department to speed up the clinical assessment of patients at high risk of acute cardiac events such as myocardial infarction (MI).

It aims to produce results for the cardiac marker Troponin I that are comparable to the lab - and to do this within 10 minutes from a finger prick of blood. The turnaround time (TAT) for lab tests can often be more than 60 minutes. ECG and measuring the levels of the protein Troponin I are both key diagnostic tools in the modern emergency room when determining MI.

Lab2Go runs until early 2017 at six hospitals in five countries (Austria, France, Germany, Netherlands and United Kingdom). Its goal is to demonstrate and evaluate the performance of the Minicare Acute system in an actual emergency setting, during clinical assessment, rather than having to wait for laboratory results.

As Marcel van Kasteel, Chief Executive Officer, Philips Handheld Diagnostics, explained: “Patients entering a hospital emergency department with symptoms of heart attack require immediate diagnostic evaluation to save as much heart muscle as possible.

“We want to see if the new system has the potential to deliver an accurate reading of their Troponin I levels from a finger prick of blood, within 10 minutes, instead of having to wait an hour or longer for the lab to return the results. This would enable the clinician to more quickly identify a likely myocardial infarction, or rule it out, resulting in faster treatment. In addition, costs would be saved by reducing unnecessary time spent in the emergency department.”