A system and a method for scheduling an emergency procedure in response to
detecting that a patient has a high probability of acute myocardial
infarction. The system is able to identify patients that are suspected of
having acute myocardial infarction (or acute ischemia). The system uses
one or more expert software tools or algorithms to analyze received ECG
records. Each software tool has logic (e.g., thresholds and/or settings)
for automatic routing which is configurable by the customer via a
graphical user interface. If any sufficient condition for automatic
routing is satisfied, the system routes the data (including the
underlying ECG record) and an alert to an electronic device which is
accessible by the cardiologist "on call" via a bidirectional pager. If
the cardiologist decides that the requested emergency treatment or
procedure should be performed, the system accesses the schedules of all
associated catheterization labs across multiple hospitals to identify a
lab having optimum time-to-treatment. Then the system automatically
contacts the selected catheterization lab via a network to schedule the
PTCA procedure.