The elderly patient in the coronary care unit: III. Factors affecting long-term prognosis.
Patients aged 70 years and older who were admitted to a coronary care unit in 1976 with documented acute myocardial infarction were followed to April 30, 1982. At that time, of the 46 patients who had survived initial hospitalization, 28 had died, 16 were still living, and two were lost to follow up. The actuarial survival rates were 71 per cent, 60 per cent, and 44 per cent for one, three, and five years, respectively. Only two of the variables available by history, physical examination, and clinical course of the patient in the coronary care unit had prognostic significance--complex ventricular premature beats and congestive heart failure of any degree of severity. Patients who suffered congestive heart failure during their hospitalization had a five-year survival rate of less than 25 per cent, compared with about 60 per cent for those who had neither heart failure nor complex ventricular premature beats. All five patients who had complex ventricular premature beats died within three years.
D000368:Aged; D001145:Arrhythmias, Cardiac / Q000401:mortality; D002170:Canada; D003325:Coronary Care Units; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006333:Heart Failure / Q000401:mortality; D006352:Heart Ventricles; D006801:Humans; D009203:Myocardial Infarction / Q000401:mortality*; D011379:Prognosis