You may equate a myocardial infarction with the term heart attack.
Older adults tend to experience larger infarctions and a higher incidence of mortality.
The myocardium receives its blood supply from two large coronary arteries and their branches. Usually the muscle does not receive enough blood because of occlusion of one or more of these arteries. The occlusion may result from formation of a clot that develops suddenly when an atheromatous plaque ruptures through the sublayers of a blood vessel, or when the narrow, roughened inner lining of a sclerosed artery leads to complete thrombosis . In considering the presence of cardiovascular conditions in older adults, it is important to remember that it is difficult to separate aging from disease effects. The heart size is not significantly decreased or increased as one ages.