Does it help to undiagnose angina?

We reported recently the results of re-evaluating a series of 64 patients still experiencing pain originally diagnosed as angina but with normal coronary arteriograms. A musculoskeletal cause for the chest pain was established in 38 and an oesophageal cause in 17 of these patients. We here report these patients' self-assessment of their pain 2 years after this diagnostic reclassification. It is clear that the effects of a diagnosis of angina are not easily rescinded even when the non-cardiac cause of the chest pain is identified.