Myocardial infarction among black patients: poor prognosis after hospital discharge.

Previous studies suggest that long-term survival among symptomatic black patients with coronary artery disease is reduced compared with white patients. Of 342 patients hospitalized with a myocardial infarction over a 3-year period, 285 were black and 249 of these were discharged alive. In this cohort, the all-causes mortality was 14% (95% CI, 9 to 19) at 1 year and 22% (95% CI, 13 to 31) at 2 years. Cardiac causes accounted for 71% and 82% of all deaths at 1 and 2 years, respectively. These mortality rates exceed previous reports of survival after myocardial infarction among white patients in the United States, and confirm that inner-city minority patients served by municipal health care institutions have a particularly poor prognosis for coronary artery disease.