Heart attack survival far lower in UK than Sweden

The chance of surviving a heart attack is far lower in the UK than Sweden, according to a major new study published in The Lancet . The startling findings suggest that more than 11,000 lives could have been saved over the past 7 years had UK patients experienced the same care as their Swedish counterparts. "Our findings are a cause for concern," says study leader Professor Harry Hemingway, from the Farr Institute of Health Informatics Research, and the National Institute for Cardiovascular Outcomes Research at UCL. "The uptake and use of new technologies and effective treatments recommended in guidelines has been far quicker in Sweden. This has contributed to large differences in the management and outcomes of patients." Using whole-country data from national clinical registries, the researchers analysed time trends for quality of care and outcomes for all hospitals and patients diagnosed between 2004 and 2010 - 119,786 patients from 86 hospitals in Sweden and 391,077 patients from 242 hospitals in the UK. By highlighting the prospect of a substantial excess of deaths in the UK compared with Sweden, this study draws our attention to the need for further comparative effectiveness research for heart attack treatment. Results showed that 30 days after a heart attack, death rates for UK patients were more than a third higher than for Swedish patients (10.5% vs 7.