By
Pat Hagan
20:40 EST, 10 March 2014
|
20:40 EST, 10 March 2014
A tiny implant shaped like an egg timer could banish chest pain caused by the heart condition angina.
More
than 250,000 people a year in Britain are diagnosed with the condition.
Symptoms include shortness of breath and chest pain that occurs because
furring of the arteries restricts blood and oxygen supply to the heart.
For some people, pain occurs only on exertion, but there is also an
‘unstable’ form, where pain can come on even when sitting still.
A tiny implant shaped like an egg timer could banish chest pain caused by the heart condition angina
The
new implant is designed to keep blood circulating in the heart for
longer. Research shows increasing blood supply can help to relieve
angina pain.
The pain comes from the heart having to work much harder to keep pumping when it is starved of sufficient oxygen.
The
implant reduces the rate of blood pumping out of the heart through a
vein called the coronary sinus, one of the organ’s main exit routes.
Partially blocking blood flow this way ‘diverts’ blood back into the
heart’s main pumping chambers.
The egg-timer implant has a narrow
‘waist’ of three millimetres in diameter – about the width of a drinking
straw. The wider sections on either side span to 13mm. As blood pumps
out of the heart, it enters the coronary sinus vein and comes up against
the steel implant, called the Neovasc Reducer.
When it reaches the
narrower waist, some blood continues through, but more than half of it
backs into the heart to circulate for longer.
Normally angina patients are prescribed drugs, such as beta-blockers or calcium channel blockers, to prevent attacks.
For
sudden chest pain, a drug called glyceryl trinitrate can be swallowed
as a tablet or sprayed into the mouth to give pain relief within a few
minutes.
Symptoms include shortness of breath and chest pain that occurs because furring of the arteries restricts blood
These drugs work by relaxing and widening the blood vessels supplying the heart.
Severe
cases may need a stent to improve blood flow to the heart, or bypass
surgery, where a section of blood vessel is taken from another part of
the body to reroute the flow of blood past a blocked section of artery.
Yet
around 50,000 people a year suffer angina that does not respond to
medication or they are too unwell for surgery. The new implant could be
the answer.
To insert it, doctors make a tiny incision in the
jugular vein in the neck while the patient is under sedation. They then
insert a narrow plastic tube and feed it through until it is in the
coronary sinus vein at the back of the heart.
A guide wire, with the
collapsed implant on the end and a deflated balloon inside it, is then
pushed through. Once it’s in the right position, the balloon is used to
inflate the ends, leaving the middle section narrow.
The balloon and wire are then withdrawn. The whole process takes 20 minutes.
In
a recent clinical trial, 14 patients with severe angina who failed to
respond to other treatments had the egg-timer device implanted and had
their pain assessed on a scale of one to four before and six months
later.
Findings in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology
show 12 of the 14 volunteers had less pain, and the group’s average
score fell from 3.07 to 1.64.
Dr Mike Knapton, associate medical
director at the British Heart Foundation, said: ‘For this small group of
patients, it seems to actually improve blood supply to heart muscle.
This means it could be a potential alternative therapy for people with
coronary heart disease and angina whose condition cannot be controlled.’
Meanwhile, a natural compound involved in production of adrenaline
could be a new way to tackle stiffening of the arteries in
post-menopausal women.
With the menopause, the health of women’s
arteries dramatically deteriorate – this may be linked to a fall in
oestradiol, a form of oestrogen thought to widen blood vessels, which
can lead to high blood pressure and heart disease.
Earlier studies
suggested that tetrahydrobiopterin or BH4, a natural substance involved
in the body’s production of adrenaline, can cause arteries to expand.
A U.S trial of 100 women will take a chemical version of BH4 to see if it causes a short-term increase in its levels.
or comment on this article
-
Porn star Belle Knox interviewed in her first adult film
-
‘I want to stay with my mummy!’ Newborn refuses to let go
-
Released for the first time, footage of 9/11 from space
-
Ever wondered what you sound like to a foreigner?
-
Wildlife cameraman talks about Steve Irwin’s death for first…
-
First encounter, lion and his cubs are introduced in Oregan…
-
ABC News anchor Dan Harris reveals he used drugs
-
Police investigate stolen passports used on missing plane
-
Singer denounces rumor that he is MJ’s son
-
Notorious U.S. Blackwater mercenaries ‘seen’ in Ukraine
-
Zimmerman signs autographs at gun show
-
Men on CCTV with stolen passports ‘don’t look like Asians’
-
‘One of two men who boarded doomed Air Malaysia flight on a…
-
Duke and Duchess of Cambridge ‘hire Spanish supernanny with…
-
EXCLUSIVE: ‘Welcome home daddy, I’m a porn star!’…
-
Mother jailed for stabbing her three children to death to…
-
‘I used to be sick all the time’: Dozens of Americans who…
-
‘She begged me to find her then it sounded like water’:…
-
‘I’m dying’: Cameraman reveals final words of Steve Irwin…
-
It had GPS, an indestructible black box and a beacon…
-
Father who carries his disabled son 18 MILES to school every…
-
Werewolf enthusiast, 44, ‘groomed 14-year-old girl for sex…
-
‘I lived through the Nazis years as a U-boat Jew’: Amazing…
-
Man saved from submerged car during Colorado floods set to…
Comments (0)
what you think
No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts,
or debate this issue live on our message boards.
Find out now