News Finding: The study showed that compared with no testing, EE, MPS and CCTA were associated with higher odds of undergoing cardiac catheterization and revascularization procedures without an accompanying improvement in the odds of having a heart attack.
Paper Finding: Because of limitations of MarketScan, which does not capture data on mortality, we could not assess for death among our cohort.
News Context: Patients who did not undergo initial noninvasive testing were no more likely to experience MI than those who did not receive testing. The study showed that compared with no testing, EE, MPS and CCTA were associated with higher odds of undergoing cardiac catheterization and revascularization procedures without an accompanying improvement in the odds of having a heart attack. "More studies need to be conducted to clarify the best testing strategy for low-risk patients being evaluated for chest pain in the ED.
Paper Context: We believe that the low rates of MI in all groups within 7 and 190 days of follow-up support our assumption that this was a uniformly lowrisk cohort. Because of limitations of MarketScan, which does not capture data on mortality, we could not assess for death among our cohort. Given the age of the cohort and the low rate of MI, it is unlikely that cardiac death would have significantly contributed to differences in follow-up events.