During the summer there was a 25 per cent rise in the number of people rushed to the Golden Jubilee National Hospital in Clydebank with partially blocked arteries cutting blood supply to the heart.
Mitchell Lindsay, lead consultant cardiologist at the Golden Jubilee, said: "There is not any evidence that it is as a consequence of any delayed care or missed opportunity. It is likely to be due to a multitude of factors: people being sedentary with lockdown; stress; people ignoring symptoms because they do not want to present at hospital. There are probably five to ten causes, all linked." Heart attacks are classified by a measurement that shows how much damage has been inflicted on the organ.
The number of so-called STEMI attacks, where there is extensive heart damage, recorded at the Golden Jubilee has remained stable for a decade at about 750 a year.
Shortages of hospital capacity have led to long delays in A&E as well as ambulances queueing at hospital doors.
The Golden Jubilee receives patients who have suffered heart attacks from NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, Dumfries and Galloway, Ayrshire and Arran, Forth Valley and the Highlands.
Typically heart attack victims who undergo investigations and treatment at the Golden Jubilee are sent back to emergency hospitals nearer their homes as they recover, but the centre is now keeping people on its wards until they are ready to go home, to relieve pressure elsewhere.
Lindsay's department carries out more angioplasty procedures, where a stent is placed inside a blood vessel to open it up and maintain blood flow to the heart, than any other hospital in the UK. It is the first cardiology centre in Scotland to deploy new technology that uses infrared lasers and artificial intelligence to measure how much of an artery is diseased and determine the size of stent required.
Friday, October 1, 2021
Mystery rise in heart attacks from blocked arteries
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