THIS WEEK IN 1989: Hants doctors to get heart drug training

Beecham Pharmaceuticals, makers of the clot-dissolving drug Eminase, was planning a £250,000 national training programme to teach GPs to use it.

The scheme would focus on 60 major towns and cities around the country.

Portsmouth or Southampton would be chosen as bases for the training of GPs in Hampshire.

Before, emergency treatment for heart attacks had only been carried out by hospital doctors but research showed it took an average of four hours from the start of the attack before a sufferer was taken to hospital.

Of the 230,000 heart attacks in Britain each year, 160,000 were fatal and 72,000 victims died before they reached hospital.