Epidemiology of Cardiovascular Disease and Refractory Angina

Against the background of increasing health care expenditures, coronary heart disease has a significant impact on global economics as a leading cause of disability and loss of productivity. Over 70 million Americans suffer from cardiovascular disease, contributing to approximately 900,000 deaths annually. Coronary heart disease and cerebrovascular disease account for more than six million hospitalizations every year in the USA alone [1]. As treatment outcomes of acute coronary syndromes continue to improve, more patients survive the acute event and thus their disease state changes into a chronic phase. The increasing incidence of cardiovascular risk factors such as diabetes mellitus and obesity combined with the increasing number of revascularization procedures and decreased cardiac mortality rate have transformed the demographic of patients with ischemic heart disease into a steadily increasing population of patients with chronic, and occasionally refractory, angina pectoris.