I'm coming at this as someone who had an MI at a relatively young age:

For the goals -- and this may differ between EMT / paramedic & protocols -- but I would really wish that there was a blood draw done in the field. Before they bring you to the cath lab with a suspected MI, the ER is likely going to draw blood to get troponin levels at a 2-hour interval. You could save some time & heart muscle by getting a blood sample (containing initial levels) in the field.

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DrewADesign 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Maybe paramedics, but basic EMTs don’t even start IVs where I am— It’s the sort of thing you can get certified to do in a few weeks and pays about as much as entry-level fast food work. Phlebotomy is a lot more nuanced afaik.

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jaggederest 3 hours ago | parent [-]

There's a lot of interesting research on paramedics vs emts (I believe the term of art is basic life support vs advanced cardiac life support). In areas where there is a good ER, it's better to have low level basic life support and break the sound barrier to the ER than do significant intervention on site but slow arrival at the hospital, as far as I am aware.

	▲	captainkrtek 3 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		There is a chain of things that need to be done - early recognition - early administration of aspirin and/or nitro if indicated - activation of, and transport to, a hospital with catheterization capabilities. If medics can show up and do multiple ekgs to confirm and en route, thats even better. But critically the blockage needs to cleared, and they need definitive care (cath lab).
	▲	3 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
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3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

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captainkrtek 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Certainly protocol dependent, and likely more in the paramedic realm.