New York researchers have created a tool to assess whether a medication could harm a patient's heart.
The University of Rochester Medical Center team developed a software program that provides a simple and accurate way to analyze the electrocardiograms of people who volunteer for clinical trials to test new drugs, a spokesman said Friday.
The patient's EKG data is loaded onto a computer, and doctors look for abnormalities related to the QT interval. This is the split-second period that occurs from the time a heart beats or contracts, through its recovery phase. Drugs that prolong the recovery phase are of concern, because they can be toxic to the heart.
The Food and Drug Administration purchased a copy of the technology, called COMPAS, for Comprehensive Analysis of Repolarization Signal. The university hopes to license the copyrighted software to drug companies and other institutions involved in pre-market drug testing, John Fahner-Vihtelic, deputy director of the Office of Technology Transfer, said Friday.
© Copyright 2004 by United Press International
