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Previous Volume 342:1187-1195 April 20, 2000 Number 16 Next

	Since this article has no abstract, we have provided an extract of the first 100 words of the full text and any section headings.

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The evaluation of acute chest pain remains challenging, despite many insights and innovations over the past two decades. The percentage of patients who present at the emergency department with acute chest pain and are admitted to the hospital may actually be increasing.^1,2,3,4,5,6 The reasons for clinical caution are familiar to most physicians. Patients with acute myocardial infarction who are mistakenly discharged from the emergency department have short-term mortality rates of about 25 percent, at least twice what would be expected if they were admitted.⁷ The legal costs that can result from such cases constitute the largest category of losses from . . . [Full Text of this Article]

Clinical Evaluation

Emergency Treatment

Macromolecular Markers of Myocardial Injury

The Decision to Admit: AIDS and Guidelines

Where to Admit and for How Long

Units for the Evaluation of Chest Pain

Reducing the Length of Stay

Exercise Tests, Scintigraphy, Echocardiography, and Early Coronary Angiography

Conclusions

Source Information

From the Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, and Partners Community HealthCare, Boston (T.H.L.); and the Department of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine, San Francisco (L.G.).

Address reprint requests to Dr. Lee at Partners Community HealthCare, Prudential Tower Suite 1150, 800 Boylston St., Boston, MA 02199, or at thlee@partners.org.

References

Related Letters:

Patients with Acute Chest Pain
Ahmed W., Fan T. M., Bostwick J. M., Lee T. H., Goldman L.
Extract | Full Text  
N Engl J Med 2000; 343:584-585, Aug 24, 2000. Correspondence

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