The study, published in the journal Biophysics Reviews, explored how human tissue models outside the body can be used to improve the treatment and diagnosis of heart attacks. Myocardial infarction occurs when plaque in a major coronary artery slows down and blocks blood flow to the heart, depriving it of oxygen, killing cells, and leading to significant tissue damage, leading to death or transformation of affected heart tissues into scar tissue, thus making it more difficult to treat in the future.

Currently, therapies and drugs for heart attacks and many other conditions like cancer are mostly studied in the lab using animal models. However, only one out of 10 therapeutic components that work for animals ends up being successful in clinical applications. Dr. Pinar Zorlutuna, Professor, Notre Dame University, stated that although animal models give an overall systemic view of how an organism would respond to a pathological condition, it is not the exact response that a human tissue would give. But, if you have a human model along with your animal model, chances are that you can catch discrepancies between the two early on, before taking things to the clinical trial and failing there, she added.

In vitro human models, such as organoids and 3D organlike multicellular models derived from stem cells, allow researchers to examine the impact of heart attacks and treatment of the fibrotic tissue outside the body by mimicking natural development, structural organization, regeneration, and disease progression. Meanwhile, microfluidic devices control cell placement and fluid flow to act like the heart on a chip, while bioprinting allows cardiac tissue to be built up layer by layer. Dr. Zorlutuna stated that these models are very important as they can help transform therapeutic components and drugs. Co-Author, Dr. Gozde Basara stated added that despite advancements in the tissue engineering field, some challenges remain to create in vitro cardiac tissue models because the human heart is a very complex organ. 

(Source: https://theprint.in/health/study-finds-how-human-tissue-models-can-be-used-to-improve-treatment-diagnosis-of-heart-attacks/1108900/ )