Troponin serial levels

[Swalecliffe88]

I had an Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest back in Sept last year. Long story short came out of hospital a week later with a defibrillator implanted. However, my discharge letter stated that a Troponin test was done as usual I presume and the serial levels were quoted as 163 and 425. I have been curious and researching what they equate to, but can’t find any info on doctor Web 😆 Just wondering if any of my hearties knew if these figures were low, medium or high. Good, bad or indifferent.

[Captain_Birdseye]

Anything higher than 5 (or 14 depending on the test used) is considered elevated.

Troponin is supposed to stay in the heart, so should be almost undetectable in the bloodstream, so anything higher suggest the heart is happy. Given you'd just had a cardiac arrest, that would make sense.

For comparison though, the highest recorded I've had was 314, 24 hours after a myocarditis event. The cardiologist told me he'd seen levels above 25000.

[Swalecliffe88 in reply to Captain_Birdseye]

Thank you for that. Yes I’d seen figures in thousands and couldn’t relate them to what I had. What is significance of the 2 figures ? 163 & 425

[Captain_Birdseye in reply to Swalecliffe88]

Just that there's been a cardiac event really... it doesn't last long I the blood so the numbers come down reasonably quickly once the event is over.

If you go checked now they should be pretty low or negligible

[Swalecliffe88 in reply to Captain_Birdseye]

Brilliant understand now thanks very much for explanation

[EU95PTM]

Mine were in excess of 25,000 when I was admitted after a stemi. How I survived I do not know!

[Swalecliffe88 in reply to EU95PTM]

frightening isn’t it. But that’s what I didn’t understand when I had heart attack it was in the thousands. But didn’t even know i had it. But when I had the cardiac arrest it was hundreds, yet with CA i technically died for a few minutes.

[Hidden]

I have to admit I am baffled as to what traponin levels they use? I had a test a few months ago and it was 26.2 and no explanation of what it relates to. No one seemed too fussed and I don't know if different machines give different values. Depending on what the hospital uses. There is lots of different explanation but nothing gives an easy explanation.

[Milkfairy Heart Star]

Hello,

Cgbt

Troponin blood levels are also raised in other situations, not always heart related or due to a heart attack. Troponin blood levels can be raised in the following circumstances:

Inflammation, myocarditis or pericarditis, trauma, post heart surgery, pulmonary embolism, kidney disease, infection, including the one that begins with C, extreme exercise, coronary vasospasms, heart arrthymias, raised heart rate, Takostubo syndrome and heart failure.

In the UK high sensitivity troponins I or T are usually used, measured in units ng/L.

When numbers are quoted without units and the usual laboratory reference ranges they are meaningless.

In the US the units commonly used are ng/ ml .

Women can have lower levels of troponin when they have a heart attack.

Approx 10% of heart attacks occur without any permanent blockages by plaque in the coronary arteries. Myocardial Infarction non obstructive coronary arteries MINOCA. The possible causes are microvascular dysfunction, coronary vasospasms, spontaneous coronary artery dissection, a blood clot or piece of plaque that has broken off the wall of the artery blocking a coronary artery.

Women are more likely to experience a MINOCA.

Diagnosing a heart attack is not always straightforward.

I was once told by Cardiologist you can have a little bit of a heart attack but you can't be a little bit pregnant 😊

For further details see the 4th Unversal definition of a Myocardial Infarction.

academic.oup.com/eurheartj/...

[Sljp0000 in reply to Milkfairy]

Yes, my Troponin levels were through the roof when I had a PE after my CABG x

[Milkfairy Heart Star in reply to Sljp0000]

I hope you have fully recovered from your pulmonary embolism.

[wischo in reply to Milkfairy]

Very informative, thank you.

[Swalecliffe88]

Thanks for link. Interesting will read in more depth when have a little more time. Thanks again

[Alison_L]

Three weeks after my (silent) heart attack (it presented as a gastro problem so I can be pretty certain when it happened), my troponin was still 153, causing an out-of-hours doc to phone me up shouting “YOU’RE HAVING A HEART ATTACK, YOU NEED TO BE IN HOSPITAL!!!”. I was sitting in a pub with friends at time 😀