Study Examines Heart Attack Outcomes

Patients with hypertension who have a heart attack for the firsttime experience fewer in-hospital complications, compared withindividuals without high blood pressure. For the study, theresearchers looked at in-hospital results in 915 patients withhypertension and 915 patients without the condition followingtheir first heart attack. The researchers learned that the highblood pressure group had greater risk factors including diabetes,poor lipid profiles, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.This group, however, had considerably lower rates of heart complicationsand death, compared with the control group.

"To the best of our knowledge, the current report is the first to indicatesuch a clear-cut significant difference in outcome of first-time[heart attack] in hypertensive and normotensive subjects," concludedthe researchers recently in the American Journal of Hypertension.They said that additional studies are needed to more clearlyunderstand the reasons for these differences.