Next generation cardiac point-of-care testing

冠心病是英国人死亡的主要原因之一。在英国，每天都有超过2500名患者出现胸痛，这表明他们疑似心脏病发作。其中，只有20%的人会确诊心脏病发作。到达急诊室后，诊断通常需要几个小时，而医疗保健专业人员则要等待医院实验室处理检测结果。更快地识别这些患者将挽救生命，而剩余的80%没有心脏病发作的患者及时出院，将最大限度地减少不必要的入院和NHS的费用。心脏病发作时，一种叫做肌钙蛋白（Tn）的蛋白质从受损的心肌中释放到血液中。测量这种蛋白质可以帮助医生判断病人是否患有心脏病。Tn检测结合心电图（ECG）是胸痛患者排除心脏病发作的金标准。为了最终排除心脏病发作，Tn水平必须非常低，并且需要进行非常高灵敏度的肌钙蛋白（hsTn）测试。目前，hsTn检测是在中心医院实验室进行的，可能需要数小时才能返回。对英国领先心脏病专家的采访证实，人们非常渴望一种简单易用、即时的hsTn测试，以迅速排除心脏病发作，释放宝贵的床位和有限的资源。即时检测是一种简单、廉价且易于使用的血液检测设备，可以在患者身边使用，无需将血液样本送到医院实验室。Psyros正在开发一种改变游戏规则的护理点技术，能够测量临床医生需要的极低水平的Tn，以便尽快做出关键的规则/排除决策。我们的创新系统旨在检测从手指上采集的一滴血中的超低Tn水平，并在10分钟内给出准确且可操作的结果。更快、更准确地选择患者可以带来更好的健康结果。随着结果的改善，患者在医院的时间减少，生活质量提高，最终减轻了过度紧张的健康（NHS）和社会保健系统的经济负担。

Coronary heart disease is one of the leading causes of death within the UK. Every day over 2500 patients present at A&E departments across the UK with chest pain, indicative of a suspected heart attack. Of these, only 20% will have a confirmed heart attack. Diagnosis often takes several hours after arriving at A&E while healthcare professionals wait for test results to be processed by the hospital laboratory.Faster identification of these patients will save lives, whilst timely discharge of the remaining 80%, who are not suffering a heart attack, will minimise unnecessary admissions and costs to the NHS.During a heart attack a protein called troponin (Tn) is released into the bloodstream from the damaged heart muscle. Measuring this protein helps doctors determine if a patient is suffering from a heart attack.Tn testing in combination with electrocardiogram (ECG) is the gold standard to rule in/out heart attack for patients with chest pain. To conclusively rule out heart attack the Tn levels must be extremely low and requires a very high sensitivity troponin (hsTn) test. Currently hsTn testing is carried out in the central hospital lab and can take hours to be returned. Interviews with leading UK cardiologists confirmed a very strong desire for a simple to use, point-of-care hsTn test to rapidly rule-out heart attack and free-up valuable beds and limited resource. Point-of-care tests are simple, cheap and easy to use blood testing devices that can be used near the patient, eliminating the need to send blood samples to the hospital lab.Psyros are developing a game-changing point-of-care technology able to measure the extremely low levels of Tn required by the clinicians to make the critical rule in/rule out decision as quickly as possible. Our innovative system is designed to detect ultra-low Tn levels from a drop of blood taken from the finger, giving accurate and actionable results within 10 mins.Faster and accurate patient selection leads to better health outcomes. With improved outcomes, patients spend fewer days in hospital and have a better quality of life, ultimately reducing the economic burden on overstretched health (NHS) and social care systems.