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for cooling heart-attack patients
A cold body, not to mention a cold heart, may help some heart-attack patients. Medical center researchers believe cooling the body may minimize damaging effects of a heart attack and are testing the technique in patients.
"This is a promising procedure that could revolutionize the way we treat heart attacks," said David Lee, an interventional cardiologist. "I have great hope that therapeutic cooling can preserve heart muscle and improve a patient's long-term prospects."
Stanford is one of the only medical centers in California participating in a randomized, multi-site clinical study of the cooling technique that involves inducing hypothermia - or subnormal body temperature - in heart-attack patients. The cooling may protect cells that can become damaged during an attack.
"Cooling is not a novel idea," Lee said, noting that heart surgeons often induce hypothermia during procedures.
During a heart attack, blood flow is reduced or stopped in the arteries, depriving the heart of oxygen and causing irreversible damage to the heart muscle. A physician's treatment goal is to prevent or minimize this damage, and Lee said researchers have long known that cooling has protective qualities. Researchers believe cold temperatures preserve and protect cells when the heart's oxygen supply is cut off, he said.
The study involves using the cooling therapy on heart-attack patients who are treated with angioplasty - a procedure to open blocked blood vessels. To initiate cooling, physicians place a small catheter into a vein in the patient's leg. The catheter is connected to a device that induces mild cooling to 91.4 F. "Basically, we're stealing heat from the body and sending it to a machine," Lee said.
Patients are cooled for three hours, given medication to prevent the normal human shivering response to being cold, and are then slowly warmed.
