First Aid News - May 2007

ECGs Transmitted by Smart Phones Cut Treatment Delays

A US medical centre is giving its paramedics smart phones that are capable of transmitting heart attack patients' ECG data from the patient to the hospital ahead of the arrival at the emergency room. Data can be taken and transmitted at the flick of a switch instead of having to be collected and analysed after arrival.

The New Jersey hospital (UMDNJ) has gone from being in the bottom 10% of hospitals to now being in the top 10% for this type of emergency care. They used to need an average of 146 minutes before intervention treatment was started. Now, it is down to 73 minutes.

The paramedic transmits the data from the patient and it ends up as a PDF document at the emergency room and at the catheter lab. The specialists at the hospital can begin analysis whilst the patient is in transit and the ambulance can be directed to the appropriate treatment room depending on the interpretation of the data.