PERFORMANCE OF HIGH SENSITIVE TROPONIN T ASSAY IN EARLY DIAGNOSIS OF MYOCARDIAL INFARCTION

Issa Alnjauidi*, Ibrahim Ahmed Alhabsi, Khalid Mohammed Almarhobi, Amjad Abduallah Alsouti and Dr. Hassan Sadek

ABSTRACT

Background: High sensitive troponin T assay (hs-Tn T assay) is one of the most important tests in clinical laboratories. It is commonly used as a diagnostic test for the acute myocardial infarction. However, many health clinics have doubted the ability of this assay to rule in or out myocardial infarction. It is important to review available studies to determine the possibility of using this assay in the early diagnosis of myocardial infarction. This systematic review was conducted to evaluate the performance of this assay at presentation and compare it with conventional troponin assay. Method: PubMed, Cochrane databases, EBSCO, AccessMedicine and Google scholar were searched to find out the studies that evaluate the performance of the high sensitive troponin T assay and compare it to conventional troponin assay. As results of using the inclusion and exclusion criteria and The QUADAS tool 4 studies were selected. All of these studies assess the performance of high sensitive troponin T assay (hs-Tn T assay) and compare it with conventional troponin assay. Results: The high sensitive troponin T assay has better performance than conventional troponin assay in early diagnosis of MI. It is extremely sensitive assay can help the physician to recognize the acute myocardial infarction early before other complication can develop. Based on the extracted data the mean sensitivity of this assay in 4 studies at presentation is 83.5% while the specificity is 76.8%. Conclusion: Both conventional troponin assay and high sensitive troponin T assay has good accuracy. However, the hs-Tn T assay has better sensitivity at presentation and can improve the early diagnosis of myocardial infarction.

Keywords: AMI: acute myocardial Infarction cTnT: cardiac troponin T ED: emergency Department hs-Tn T assay: high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T, MI: myocardial infarction.