HEART Score: What is It and What is Its Major Purpose?


The HEART stands for five elements, including the history of the patient, ECG abnormalities, age of the patient, risk factors exist, and troponin measurement. These elements are the major parameters to determine the HEART score of a patient with chest pain in the emergency ward.


What is the HEART Score?  


The HEART score can be described in two distinct ways, including:


A Procedure: The HEART score is a clinical procedure in which specialized health professionals examine the heart health of the patients with chest pain based on their health history, ECG abnormalities, age, risk factors, and troponin measurement. This procedure is conducted within the health centers to risk-stratify the heart patients in high, medium, and low-risk categories. 


A Numerical Score: The HEART score is also defined as a numerical score that is given to patients with chest pain. This score is determined based on the examination of the five elements we have listed above and can be calculated manually or using a HEART score calculator. The final HEART score reveals how severe the heart health of a patient is. 


The Purpose of HEART Score 


Earlier, several heart patients used to end up dying due to not getting the treatment timely. And the treatments were not provided timely because doctors didn't have the information related to the risk level in the patients. That's where the need for a risk-stratification method for heart patients is realized by health experts. And then the HEART score system was developed. 


The major purpose of the HEART score is to risk stratify the heart patients into high, medium, and low-risk groups so that the patients with high risk can get the treatment earlier than other patients. This system has been very helpful in reducing the percentage of patients that end up dying due to not getting the treatment. 


HEART Scoring Pattern 


As we have already mentioned above, the HEART score is determined based on five elements, including the patient's health history, ECG, patient's age, risk factors, and troponin measurements. All these elements are given a score between 0 to 2 and the total of these scores is considered the final HEART score of a patient.


Patients with a 0-3 HEART score have only a 1.6% chance of experiencing a cardiac event while the patients with a HEART score of 7 or more than this have about a 50% chance of experiencing the cardiac event in the next 3 weeks and so they are prioritized for the treatment. To know more about this and other medical algorithms, such as autosomal dominant compelling helio ophthalmic outburst syndrome in detail, visit the official website of Medical Algorithms. 



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