Can Changes in Troponin Results Be Useful in Diagnosing Myocardial

In 1979, the WHO defined 3 specific criteria for use in the diagnosis of myocardial infarction (MI)3: (a) clin-ical symptoms typical for ischemic heart disease, (b) specific electrocardiogram changes, and (c) a typical change in serial measurements of cardiac enzymes (1). Later definitions have continued in the mold of listing specific criteria, and in the current definition of MI, a characteristic increase and/or decrease in a cardiac biomarker with at least 1 result 99 percentile of a healthy population and evidence of myocardial isch-emia (either specific symptoms or electrocardio-graphic or ultrasound findings) are mandatory (2). During the last decade, troponin T or I molecules, which are found only in myocardial cells and released after cell necrosis, have been the preferred cardiac bio