Black-White Treatment Differences in Acute Myocardial Infarction

Previous research has documented that black patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) are significantly less likely than white patients to receive cardiac procedures. This article seeks to expand this research by: controlling for the limited ability of low-income elderly to pay for care; and adjusting for the impact of differential mortality. We selected a sample of 18,202 Medicare beneficiaries admitted during 1992 with AMI, and followed them for 90 days. Even after adjusting for other factors, black patients with AMI were less likely to undergo cardiac catheterization, and if catheterized, less likely to receive a revascularization procedure.