UCC research may save hundreds of heart attack victims

HUNDREDS of heart attack victims’ lives could be saved and Irish health service costs could be cut by €50 million a year with a new treatment being developed at University College Cork.

The college’s Centre for Research in Vascular Biology hopes to begin clinical trials using the injection of a tiny dose of insulin-like growth factor into the heart to help prevent cardiac muscles from failing.

Up to 10 million patients worldwide each year suffer heart attacks so severe that they require emergency opening of the artery and insertion of a stent to keep it open. But 1 million will suffer heart failure in the following weeks, in some cases causing death.