Door-to-Balloon Time
What It Means For Our Patients
What increases the chances of surviving
a heart attack?
- Quicker door-to-balloon time: The time
between when a patient enters an emergency
room and when an angioplasty balloon or
stent is inserted into a diseased artery.
How does quicker door-to-balloon time preserve
quality of life for heart attack patients?
- Time is muscle: Preserving quality of life is
directly related to preserving heart muscle.
The faster an artery is unblocked with a stent,
the more heart muscle is saved.
At Rhode Island Hospital, a national leader
in acute cardiac care, we understand the
importance of door-to-balloon time and have
invested in reducing it for our heart attack
patients by:
- Locating our cardiac catheterization laboratory
directly inside our emergency department—we
are one of the first in the nation to do so—allowing our physicians to rapidly prepare
for angioplasty
- Instituting a one-call system, in which a
central operator contacts and mobilizes an
angioplasty team
- Establishing a 12-lead EKG ambulance
program with the Providence, Warwick and
Cranston fire departments. Paramedics
transmit EKG results en route, so we can
activate the cardiac catheterization laboratory
before the patient arrives at the hospital.
Heart Attack Warning Signs
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