Almost a third of people in England and Wales are being given the wrong initial diagnosis after a heart attack, research suggests.
British Heart Foundation look behind the headlines.
Women were more likely to be affected, and are 50 per cent more likely than men to have an initial diagnosis different from their final diagnosis, The University of Leeds study found.
It looked at NHS data over nine years, which involved 243 NHS hospitals, and about 600,000 heart attack cases. Around one third, 198,534 patients, were initially misdiagnosed.
The two main types of heart attack are STEMI and NSTEMI. STEMI occurs when there’s a total blockage of one of the coronary arteries that supplies oxygenated blood to the heart muscle. NSTEMI, which is more common, is a partial blockage of one or more arteries. Both result in serious damage to the heart muscle.
This research found that women who had a final diagnosis of STEMI had a 59 per cent greater chance of a misdiagnosis compared with men. Women who had a final diagnosis of NSTEMI had a 41 per cent greater chance of a misdiagnosis when compared with men.
It estimated that, if heart attack patients were correctly diagnosed initially then – over the decade of study – over 250 deaths per year might have been prevented.
But the research is likely to underestimate the number of preventable deaths. The researchers excluded patients who died in hospital because they were unsure what treatments they had received, and the NHS data they used does not record data for all patients who have had a heart attack. Therefore, the numbers of preventable deaths is underestimated, suggesting even greater potential for improvement.
Read more on their website here >> https://www.bhf.org.uk/heart-matters-magazine/news/behind-the-headlines/misdiagnosis