Troponin - the blood test that detects heart attacks
Channel: York Cardiology
Date: 2020-01-17

My name is Sanjay Gupta and I believe that high quality, jargon free health related information should be freely available to all. Please subscribe to @ yorkcardiology for more videos. My WhatsApp is 447951310008. Cardiac troponins are proteins that are found in heart muscle and play a role in the contraction of the heart muscle. If heart muscle is in someway damaged or injured, then cardiac troponins are leaked into the blood and can therefore be measured in the blood stream. They have therefore become exceptionally useful markers of cardiac cell injury and this is why anyone who presents to hospital with symptoms of chest discomfort will have a blood test to measure troponin to look for objective evidence of cardiac damage. The original troponin assays were not very sensitive and any detectable troponin in the blood was considered abnormal. As the assays for measuring troponins in the blood have improved, we now use high sensitivity troponin assays which are extremely sensitive at picking up Troponin into the blood and we are now realising that even healthy and normal people may have tiny amounts of troponin in their blood. However to find a troponin value which is above the 99% centile value is definitely abnormal as is a rapidly increasing troponin from baseline. The finding of a very high or rapidly rising troponin in a patient complaining of acute chest discomfort or a very abnormal ECG  is all that is needed to confirm a diagnosis of a heart attack.
Here are 5 facts that you may find useful to know about Troponin: