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Prehospital electrocardiography is frequently used to reduce door-to-balloon times for patients with suspected ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), but is prehospital computer interpretation of electrocardiograms (ECGs) accurate? To find out, researchers retrospectively analyzed 200 prehospital ECGs transmitted by emergency medical services to a single trauma center in Ohio over a 3-year period. The study included ECGs for 100 patients who underwent immediate cardiac catheterization after being diagnosed with STEMI in the emergency department based on the initial prehospital ECG and for 100 randomly selected patients without STEMI.
Prehospital computer interpretation correctly labeled ECGs as “acute MI suspected” for 58 STEMI …