Cardiac patients’ fast track to Wellington
Scores of Midcentral District Health Board heart-attack patients will have a better chance of survival thanks to a new fast-track ambulance service to Wellington Hospital.
St John has started providing a direct link to Wellington that will avoid life-threatening delays at Palmerston North Hospital waiting for transfers.
The new service will apply to patients suffering a ‘‘STEMI’’ type of heart attack, a St-segment elevation myocardial infarction, in which a coronary artery is completely blocked and a large part of the heart muscle is unable to receive blood.
The placing of a stent to open the artery cannot be done at Palmerston North Hospital and about 238 patients a year have to go to Wellington for procedures.
Midcentral District Health Board operations executive for acute and elective specialist services Lyn Horgan said St John staff would liaise directly with a Wellington cardiologist about the best option.
St John would be able to give suitable patients a clot-busting drug in the ambulance, then take them directly to Wellington.
Bypassing assessment and waiting times at Palmerston North Hospital would reduce the ‘‘door to needle’’ time, reducing the risks of death or irreversible damage to the heart muscle.
The direct route would also make it more straightforward for family members to know where to go to support a patient.
At Palmerston North, a diagnostic angiography could be carried out to get a picture of artery blockages, but the stenting procedure could not be done.
Midcentral District Health Board is working on a plan to build a ‘‘cath’’ lab at Palmerston North Hospital to improve its cardiac services, but Horgan said that could be a couple of years away.
Even with that facility in Palmerston North, Horgan said most of the patients treated there would be having elective procedures as opposed to emergency interventions at any time of day or night.
St John would be able to give suitable patients a clot-busting drug in the ambulance, then take them directly to Wellington.