Heart attack advance
The Government has launched a bedside blood test that can recognise hearth attacks in minutes instead of hours. Health Minister Andrew Little says the research, led by emergency doctors at Christchurch Hospital, is ground-breaking. He says within eight minutes, doctors can use a high-precision prick to tell whether a person with chest pain is having a heart attack. From February, 11 hospitals including Whangarei and North Shore will start using the test.