What is Acute Myocardial Infarction & its management? - Dr. Mohan Kumar HN

Acute myocardial infarction is a life threatening cardiac emergency. Here the time is the most precious thing. We need to identify if the patient is having acute myocardial infarction or not and as soon as the diagnosis of acute myocardial infarction is made, we need to start the treatment as early as possible. We start with the anti-platelet medications. Two dual anti-platelet medications are given and along with that cholesterol reducing medications and along with the blood thinners, we also use the medication which prevent the clot formation. Once the medications are given, depending in whether the patient has an ST elevation or non ST elevation MI. If the patient is having ST elevation myocardial infarction, then we need to act quickly because the more time we waste, the more damage to the heart muscle happening. So we need to revascularise the patient as early as possible. There are 2 methods of doing the revascularisation the most important and best method of revascularisation is by taking the patient to the cath lab ad doing an angiogram. If the block is forced we need to open it and put a stent an re-establish the blood flow. This needs to be done as early as possible. so once the blood supply to the heart muscle is established the damage to the heart muscle is minimised. In some centres where this facility is not available, we need to use clot busters or thrombolytic agents. So apart from this, we need to support the whole system. So the patient might be in the heart failure. So we may need to use medication to remove the extra fluid that might accumulate in the body. We might need oxygen or ventilator support depending upon the patients requirement, but whatever needs to be done, if the treatment should starts as early as possible. So time is the muscle. so the more the time we waste in identifying and treating the problem, the more damage to the heart muscle happens and if the delay is prolonged, there may be a risk of death also.