Progress in reducing inpatient mortality from acute myocardial infarction is slow.

Editor—Brown et al report a substantial increase in the use of beneficial interventions for patients admitted to hospital with acute myocardial infarction in Nottingham from 1982 to 1992.1 However, they found no change in inpatient mortality adjusted for age and sex. This contrasts with findings in Ontario, Canada, where hospital discharge abstracts show that inpatient mortality fell from 1981 to 19912 and has since fallen further (data on request). Brown et al suggest that the disparate results may reflect coding errors …