Doctors of a hospital here claimed to have performed an emergency angioplasty on a 42-year-old man within 34 minutes of him being brought to the hospital, significantly reducing the door-to-balloon turn-around-time (TAT) of 90 minutes according to internationally-accepted protocol.

Door-to-balloon time refers to the time taken for heart attack victims to receive balloon angioplasty treatment from the moment they walk through the hospital doors. Chennai resident Santosh Kumar, who was on a business trip to the national capital, collapsed after complaining of chest pain on October 9.