Impact of an acute coronary syndrome (ACS) specialist nurse service to reduce time to coronary angiography +/- revascularisation

We each collected 6 months’ data for NSTEMI patients admitted before (2016) and after (2017) the introduction of the ACS– CNS service. The audit analysed the time from admission to angiography for both groups. A system called infoflex is used in the hospital to record the details about angiograms and percutaneous coronary interventions. The data about NSTEMI was collected electronically from this system. Then, the patients who met the exclusion criteria were excluded. The exclusion criteria include type 2 NSTEMI (ischaemic myocardial necrosis due to supply-demand mismatch, eg coronary spasm, low blood pressure, anaemia, or arrhythmias) and patients unfit for angiography for other medical comorbid reasons including pulmonary oedema or sepsis. 112 and 100 patients were eligible for the study in 2016 and 2017, respectively.