Applying WCACG modified process is beneficial on reduced door-to-balloon time of acute STEMI patients

Abstract

Background: Various systems have employed with the objective to reduce the time from emergency medical services contact to balloon inflammation for ST-elevation myocardial infraction (STEMI) patients. The WCACG message system was used to an alternative communication platform to improve confirmation of the diagnosis and movement to treatment, resulted in shorten the door-to-balloon (D-to-B) time for STEMI patients.

Methods: We collected 366 STEMI patients admitted at the Sixth Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Qingyuan People's Hospital, Department of Cardiology, during the period from June 2013 to October 2015. The patients were divided into two groups one underwent the current GC processes and the other group was handled using WCACG system. We compared between two groups with several indicators including D-to-B time, duration of hospitalization, associated costs, and incidence of adverse cardiovascular events.

Results: The results show that the new method with WCACG system significantly reduced the average D-to-B time (from 100.42 ± 25.14 mins to 79.81 ± 20.51 mins, P < 0.05) compared to the GC processes, and also reduced the duration, costs and undesirable cardiac incidence during hospitalization.

Conclusions: The modified WCACG process is an applicable system to save pieces of time and efficiently integrate the opinions of experts in emergency.

Fig. 1

D-to-B time cost of GC modified process and WCACG modified process. (A) GC process reduced D-to-B time process cost by 100 min from over 4 h originally traditional diagnosis process, but still wastes a lot of time on cardiac catheterization and diagnosis after the STEMI patient’s arrival at the emergency department. (B) Based on green channel modified process, WeChat modified process is a major help in reducing the time spent on cardiac catheterization, diagnosis, dissections between doctors and surgery preparation.