Hospital mortality in myocardial infarction

Abstract

The World Health Organisation (1969) reported that ischemic heart disease has reached enormous proportions, striking more and more at younger subjects. Acute myocardial infarction is an extremely common emergency in general hospitals with a high incidence of acute medical admissions. It is now generally agreed that the introduction of coronary care units, by providing facilities for early detection of arrhythmias and emergency resuscitation, has contributed substantially to lower the hospital mortality from myocardial infarction. The purpose of this paper is to review the cases of myocardial infarction admitted into a medical unit of St. Luke's Hospital Malta in the years 1968 and 1969 as well as to assess the factors affecting the hospital mortality in this group of patients. All studies on myocardial infarction have confirmed the fact that most of the hospital deaths occur in the first 48 hours. In the present series, 34.6% of all deaths occurred in the first 24 hours.