11:05 AM PDT on Friday, July 2, 2004

By CHRIS INGALLS / KING 5 News

SEATTLE - Doctors at Harborview Medical Center are teaming up with Seattle medics in a daring new treatment to bring heart attack patients back from the dead.

KING Medic One responds to about 200 heart-attack victims a year.

The program, the first of its kind in the country, sends patients into a deep freeze in the ambulance. It’s long been known that dropping a heart attack victim's body temperature improves chances of recovery. So in the first experiment of its kind, Seattle paramedics are taking a new treatment to the streets.

If you have a heart attack in Seattle, a medic unit will show up with state-of-the art equipment. But soon, Seattle Fire Department's seven medic units will be testing a decidedly low-tech treatment for heart attack victims. They will use a syringe to inject a cold liquid into the veins of victims of massive heart attacks.

“This therapy is for the guy who drops dead right in front of you,” said paramedic Michael Coolidge.

When the heart stops beating, blood and oxygen stop flowing and brain cells start dying. The damage can continue, even after a victim is resuscitated. So once they have a heart beat again, Seattle medic crews will reach into a bag of cold saline and inject a quart-and-a-half into the victim's bloodstream.

Doctors say the cold saline will drop a heart attack victim's body temperature by eight degrees or so, just enough to help save brain cells.

“If we can cool the brain, this tremendous cascade of death where the cells lose their inner stability can be prevented by cooling," said Dr. Michael Copass, director of emergency services at Harborview Medical Center.

Doctors say it's similar to the frequent cases of people surviving after long periods submerged in frigid water.

Previous studies have proven that chilling the brain until the patient can receive full treatment at the ER improves chances of survival.

Harborview's experiment is the first to use a simple, innovative approach to ice victims within minutes of a heart-attack.

Over the next year, it’s expected that the fire department will respond to about 200 heart-attack victims. Results of the study are expected in about a year.