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Heart failure

Heart problems’ scent

A non-invasive biomarker can diagnose, in seven minutes, the severity of heart failure, by evaluating the acetone exhaled by the patient. The project, which had FAPESP support, began as the result of an observation made by physician Fernando Bacal from InCor, the Heart Institute of the University of São Paulo (USP). He noticed that patients with severe heart failure released an odd smell when their condition was not under control. After this, together with USP’s Chemical Institute, he developed a portable device to capture the exhaled substance. “The air collected was analyzed in a mass spectrometer and the compound that was identified was acetone,” says Bacal. Comparative tests were then conducted with another substance, called BNT, having been taken from patients’ blood. This is the gold standard of heart failure markers. Both the biomarker and the portable collecting device have been patented.

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