Declining trends in acute myocardial infarction attack and mortality rates, celebrating progress and ensuring future success

摘要

The huge falls in coronary heart disease (CHD) mortality rates which started in Western countries in the 1960s have continued into the 21st century. They represent profoundly important and much studied epidemiological phenomena. The WHO's Multinational MONItoring of trends and determinants in CArdiovascular disease (MONICA) project, Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) community-wide surveillance and hospital discharge study and IMPACT model studies in diverse populations highlighted the crucial contributions of decreases in both CHD incidence and case fatality to overall trends. However, such favourable trends in CHD mortality have not been universal and absolute numbers of deaths have been generally increasing throughout the world because of population growth and ageing. In their Heart paper, Degano et al explore recent myocardial infarction trends in several European countries to provide a much-needed, detailed update to previous trend analyses for the new millennium.