The well-attended session, which was all in English, focused on Primary PCI in STEMI – guidelines and local solutions.
Saila Vikman, President of the Finnish Cardiac Society (FCS) and Steen Dalby Kristensen, FESC, ESC Vice-president chaired the session in which Dr Kristensen also gave one of the four presentations. His excellent lecture was about primary PCI, technics and adjuvant treatments. Dr Kjell Nikus (FCS) gave an insight on how to improve the logistics of care in Finland. Dr Jyrki Lilleberg (FCS) showed the results of a new survey of STEMI treatment (HUS STEMI) in the Helsinki region, and in the last lecture, Dr Ilkka Tierala (FCS) talked further about evidence-based treatment of STEMI and how to implement it in Finland.
The discussion was quite vivid and concentrated mostly on logistics and adjuvant treatment of primary PCI. In Finland, we have currently only two centres with 24 hours / 7 days service in cardiology. Evidence based secondary prevention and medications are widely adopted, but the use of primary PCI as a reperfusion strategy is limited. One aspect to discuss is also the long geographic distance especially in northern Finland.
Finnish Cardiac Society is very pleased about this new initiative of joint sessions. We think that it is very important initiative, because the joint sessions further improve patient care, as they enhance the scientific discussion with European experts and create also other collaboration between ESC and its National Societies.