Cardiac troponin T levels at 96 hours reflect myocardial infarct size: A pathoanatomical study

We determined the utility of single-point measurements of circulating cardi ac troponin T (cTnT) for the noninvasive estimation of infarct size in 16 b eagle dogs after left anterior descending artery (LAD) ligation. Pathoanato mical infarct sizes were determined by the triphenyltetrazolium chloride me thod and correlated with serum concentration changes of cTnT. Peak cTnT lev els (14.10 +/- 4.71 mu g/l) were reached after 110 +/- 21 h. A significant correlation was found between peak cTnT levels (p = 0.0001, r = 0.83) or cu mulative cTnT levels and relative infarct size (p = 0.0010, r = 0.72). A si ngle cTnT measurement 96 h after LAD ligation was equally predictive of inf arct size (p = 0.0010, r = 0.74) as peak or cumulative cTnT levels derived from serial sampling. cTnT levels at 96 h may thus be useful for practical and cost-effective estimation of infarct size. Copyright (C) 2000 S. Karger AG, Basel.