Manchester Heart Centre leading national patient recruitment in national study
Congratulations to Manchester Heart Centre research staff for leading the way nationally for patient recruitment, by becoming the top recruiting site on the PRE18FFIR in the country for a second time.
Heart attacks are caused by blood clots in areas of arteries which are damaged by a build-up of small fatty lumps, known as plaques. These can break and cause blood to stick to the wall of the blood vessel, sometimes seemingly without causing any symptoms, but which may put patients at increased risk of future heart attack. Heart attack patients can often have more than one damaged plaque. The study, led locally by Principal Investigator Dr Parthiban Arumugam, is investigating the use of a heart scanning technique to identify at risk plaques in the arteries supplying the heart muscle.
CMFT is one of four UK centres assessing the use of a specialised scanning technique known as PET (Positron Emission Tomography) using a tracer called 18F –Sodium Fluoride.
The lead researchers in Edinburgh had previously done a proof of concept study that had indicated that this type of scanning could identify the culprit plaque that caused the recent heart attack and other ones that are high risk and could potentially cause future heart attacks.
Dr Fozia Ahmed, Consultant Cardiologist and Lead Cardiology Research Consultant’, added:
All research staff at Manchester Heart Centre should be extremely proud of their efforts in recruiting patients to our expanding list of studies. Their hard work is much appreciated by all in the team and we hope it will result in developing new tests and treatments to benefit our patients.
The Manchester Heart Centre currently has 27 studies open with another five soon to follow.
