RÉSUMÉ
The new biological marker, ischemia modified albumin [IMA] measured by albumin cobalt binding [ACB] test was introducted for the detection of myocardial ischemia. The aim of the present study was to describe the performance characteristics of the ACB test in suspected acute coronary syndrome patients who presented to the emergency myocardial infarction. Forty five patients presented to the emergency department [ED] with chest pain and 31 healthy controls were involved in the study. Serum albumin and ACB test were performed on all subjects, while serum CK-MB was done on patients with chest pain only. The patients were diagnosed to have either myocardial infarction, MI [30] or unstable angina, UA [15]. Thesensitivity and specificity of the ACB test for the detection of ischemia were evaluated by ROC curve analysis. ACB test could be considered as an early test for myocardial ischemia and could detect ischemia much earlier than other eardiac markers the significant negative predictive value of the test may play an important role in the rapid ride out of myocardial ischemia and will reduce the inappropriate admission of low risk patients. However it is a poor discriminator between patients with MI and those with UA