FRIDAY, Jan. 7 (HealthDay News) -- Lower socioeconomic status (SES), as measured by years of education, may be predictive of poorer clinical outcomes in patients with acute ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), according to research published in the Jan. 11 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Rajendra H. Mehta, M.D., of the Duke University Medical Center in
Durham, N.C., and colleagues examined the association of SES and clinical outcomes in patients with acute STEMI by evaluating 11,326 STEMI patients enrolled in a trial study.
The researchers found that one-year mortality was inversely related to education level, with mortality five times higher in patients with fewer than eight years of education than in those with more than 16 years of education. The strength of this association varied by country of subjects' enrollment, but education remained an important correlate of mortality at day seven and between day eight and one year, even after adjustment for country of enrollment and baseline characteristics.
"When the number of years of education was used as a measure of SES, there was an inverse relationship such that significantly higher short-term and one-year mortality existed beyond that accounted for by baseline clinical variables and country of enrollment. Future studies should account for and investigate the mechanisms underlying this link between SES and cardiovascular disease outcomes," the authors write.
Several authors disclosed financial relationships with pharmaceutical and/or medical device companies.
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