Pain at One Year Post-MI Linked to Increased Risk for Mortality

THURSDAY, Aug. 17, 2023 (HealthDay News) -- Pain is prevalent one year after myocardial infarction (MI) and is associated with an increased risk for all-cause mortality, according to a study published online Aug. 16 in the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Linda Vixner, P.T., Ph.D., from the School of Health and Welfare at Dalarna University in Falun, Sweden, and colleagues collected data from 18,376 patients aged younger than 75 years with a registered MI event during 2004 to 2013. In secondary prevention clinics, self-reported levels of experienced pain were recorded at one year after hospital discharge. All-cause mortality data were collected up to 8.5 years after the one-year visit.

The researchers found that 38.2 and 4.5 percent of included patients reported moderate and extreme pain, respectively. A total of 1,067 deaths occurred in the cohort. For moderate and extreme pain, the adjusted hazard ratios were 1.35 and 2.06, respectively. Compared with smoking, pain was a stronger predictor of mortality.

"Clinicians managing patients after MI should recognize the need to consider experienced pain as a prognostic factor comparable to persistent smoking, and to address this when designing individually adjusted cardiac rehabilitation and secondary prevention treatments," the authors write.

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