Materia Medica Malaysiana

Prompt diagnosis reduces deaths

Patients suffering heart attacks are now diagnosed and treated within 15 minutes on arrival at the Accident and Emergency Department of Hospital Kuala Lumpur, which has been working to meet world standards in treating heart disease.
This has reduced the death rate of patients who come to the A & E Department with heart attack from 15.9 per cent to less than five per cent a year since last year.
HKL's Consultant Pulmonary and Critical Care Physician, Datuk Dr Jeyaindran Sinnadurai,(pix) said the hospital has also become the first in the country to start treating patients with heart attacks in the A & E department itself.
"The faster we identify and treat, the higher the chance of survival," he said, adding that at least one patient comes in daily with heart attack at the hospital’s A & E department.