Acute myocardial infarction in the young
Chaithiraphan, S.; Sahasakul, Y.; Charoenchob, N.
Journal of the Medical Association of Thailand 68(4): 190-197
1985
ISSN/ISBN: 0125-2208 PMID: 4031710 Document Number: 261141
Acute myocardial infarction occurs uncommonly in patients under the age of 40. An incidence of 6.2 per cent of such patients was found during a four-year period at Siriraj Hospital. All but two patients were males. The youngest patient was 22 years old. Analysis of risk factors revealed cigarette smoking in nearly half of the cases and 20 per cent had hypertension. The prevalence of hyperlipidemia and diabetes mellitus was low, 10 per cent, in each category. Of interest was the history of heavy ethanolic intake in 15 per cent of the series prior to the onset of cardiac event. Stress was thought to precipitate acute cardiac episode in 10 per cent of the cases. Of those patients undergoing coronary arteriographic studies, the majority (80%) had obstructive diseases of varying severity mostly two-vessel involvement while in those patients under 30 years of age, half were found to have normal coronary arteries. No patient died in the present series although one-fourth of the cases continued to have post-infarct angina and the other three had some degree of cardiac failure requiring anti-congestive therapy. The short-term prognosis of young-infarcted patients thus appeared to be favourable compared to the older age group.