New Gel Treatment for Post Heart Attack Recovery

News emerging from the American College of Cardiology may bring real hope for the longer term prognosis for heart attack victims.

Each and every year over a quarter of a million people suffer from a heart attack in the United Kingdom. Despite all our efforts, coronary heart disease remains the biggest killer in Great Britain and the United States.

There is a crucial time period immediately after a heart attack has been suffered, when the heart muscle, deprived of vital oxygen and other nutrients, begins to actually alter it’s physical shape, because it’s normal expansion and contraction operation has been disrupted.

This can lead to serious future heart performance problems in survivors, due to the degradation of the heart muscle’s strength, which in turn can lead to the classic symptoms of heart failure – chest pain, fatigue and breathlessness. Statistics show that up to 4 out of 10 heart attack patients die within 12 months of their attack, many from subsequent heart failure, as a direct result of the heart attack itself. Heart failure is very different from a heart attack – for more detailed information - see this article about heart failure.

Now, a new product has been developed by an Israeli company – BioLine RX -  that could tip the balance back in favour of the victim. This is a type of gel that can be injected into the damaged heart muscle, that is able to provide a supporting structure around the damaged heart tissue.

This reduces the stress on the heart during the recovery period, and can last for a couple of months before it naturally dissolves back into the body, before being removed by the kidneys.

A study conducted by Dr. Jonathan Leor from the Neufeld Cardiac Research Institute in Tel Aviv, has concluded that the new gel treatment offers safety and effectiveness in treating the post-attack recovery and recuperation process. Follow up research shows that 12 months after receiving the ground-breaking new gel treatment many patients had successfully restored a good deal of the heart’s original pre-attack capacity.

Although this new treatment is in it’s early days, it may soon prove to be a welcome new weapon in the never ending fight against devastating heart disease.