Ischemia-modified albumin appears in the serum within minutes of ischemia, before myocete necrosis, and can be detected 6 hours or more after the onset of symptoms.

In this issue of CMAJ, Worster and colleagues describe how they evaluated the prognostic capabilities of high or low levels of ischemia-modified albumin in patients with potential cardiac-ischemia symptoms (within the preceding 6 hours) by recording outcomes such as death, myocardial infarction, heart failure, arrhythmia and refractory pain within 3 days of presentation. Their analysis, as underlined by Sabatine in a related commentary, showed that levels of ischemia-modified albumin provided no useful information in predicting which patients would have a serious cardiac outcome in the short term.

Source: Eurekalert & others

Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 21 Feb 2009
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