[Certain characteristics of myocardial infarction in young patients as compared with those over 65 years old]

Death rate due to myocardial infarction shows constantly growing tendency, especially in young subjects. This fact is even referred to as overmortality of young and middle-aged men. The aim of the present study was to evaluate certain clinical elements of myocardial infarction in young subjects. Out of 668 patients with acute myocardial infarction treated at the I Cardiac Department in Cracow from 1979 to 1988 a group of 102 patients (5 women, 97 men) below 45 years of age (mean = 40) was selected. The control group consisted of 241 patients with myocardial infarction, including 146 men and 98 women over 65 years of age (mean = 73). The following clinical date were analyzed: sex, presence of retrosternal pain and its aggravation, time from the onset of pain to hospitalization, anginal pain preceding the infarction and such complication as sudden cardiac arrest, pulmonary edema, cardiogenic shock, in-hospital deaths. The infarction in patients below 45 years of age occurred mainly in men. They experienced retrosternal pain more frequently than the elderly patients. It did not, however, affect the time of hospitalization. Serious complications of the infarction developed less frequently in younger patients and the in-hospital mortality was also lower in that group.