Choice Of Hospital Could Help You Survive Heart Attack

KYW's Medical Reports Sponsored By Independence Blue Cross

By Dr. Brian McDonough, Medical Editor

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- If you want to survive a heart attack you need to recognize the warning signs and get help quickly. According to a 17-year study out of Yale, you should also pick the right hospital.

According to the study, early survival advantage of being treated for Acute MI at a good hospital with low mortality rates pays off for patients. Most of the major benefits occur the first thirty days after hospitalization. The statistics are quite revealing: people who went to high-performing hospitals lived, on average, a year longer after a heart attack than those treated at low-performing hospitals.

All of this makes sense, but the challenge is figuring out the high-performing hospitals.

One thing is clear, the high-performing hospitals are not always the biggest and they are not always teaching hospitals.

The take home message from the study is that it might be worth it to plan where you might want to be taken if a health problem occurs.