Spanish surgeons carry out 70,000 coronary stent operations every year

A report issued this week from the head of the Interventional Cardiology Unit of the La Paz University Hospital in Madrid, Raul Moreno, has revealed that a total of 70,000 patients every year receive coronary stent surgery resulting from acute myocardial infraction.

Mr Moreno has praised the leaps forward in medical technology that allows more patients than ever before to be able to be treated for the heart condition.

Every year 50,000 people die in Spain from heart disease, although the figure in constantly lowering due to coronary stent surgery being available for all in autonomous communities.

The device reduces the mortality rate of a heart attack to only four percent and once the stent is fitted, there is a 95% chance that the patient will not suffer any issues in that area.

Stents are not the only medical advancement to be helping fight the battle against heart disease. Progress in defibrillators, pacemakers, imaging techniques and even lifestyle items such as health trackers and smart watches have all aided in the reduction of heart disease cases across Spain.

The progress in technology is not the be all and end all in the fight though; head of the universities cardiology unit, Fernando Arribas has stated that although many new devices are now capable of detecting issues with the heart much earlier than ever before, it is not cable of solving the problem of causes and knowledge.

“Technology not only has to help us better detect patients, but also to produce knowledge, and we need more data to organize our processes and be more efficient.”