What Do Blood Tests Show During A Heart Attack?

— -- Question: What do blood tests show during a heart attack?

Answer: There are two types of enzymes that are measured, and generally we measure both of them. They're enzymes that are released by heart muscle when it's being damaged.

And so what happens is we draw the blood and we measure them. One's called troponin and the other is called CK. And if either, or both, of those are up or going up, it's indicative that's there's heart muscle being actively damaged, and that's the indication to physicians that there's trouble afoot and that something needs to be done right away.

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