Heart disease is the number one killer in the United States today.
But using sophisticated statistical techniques, we were able to adjust for many of the important differences between the two groups. Collaborating with her on the study were researchers from Harvard Medical School. The VA patients studied were slightly younger than the Medicare patients, and more likely to be African-American. They had significantly higher rates of diseases such as hypertension, stroke, lung disease, diabetes and dementia. The research team used two separate statistical methods to control for patient differences, to achieve a level playing field between the VA and non-VA hospitals.