MedWire News: People with high incomes and those with high levels of education are more likely to survive after suffering a heart attack than their poorer, less educated counterparts, research confirms.

Dr Vèronique Roger, from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and team studied the medical records of 705 patients in Olmsted County, Minnesota, who were treated for heart attacks between 2002 and 2006.

The team used census data to estimate the income of each patient based on his or her postal address, and questionnaires completed by the patients were used to assess their education levels.

Over an average monitoring period of more than a year, 155 of the patients died.

The researchers found that estimated income was significantly associated with the risk of surviving after a heart attack.

Indeed, 75% of patients with an estimated income of between US$28,732 (£14,659) and $44,665 (£22,789) were still alive at the end of the monitoring period, compared with 83% of patients with an estimated income of $49,435 (£25,223) to $53,561 (£27,328) and 86% of those with an estimated income of $56,992 (£29,079) to $74,034 (£37,774).

Similarly, education levels were associated with heart attack survival. The team found that 67% of patients with fewer than 12 years of education were still alive at the end of the monitoring period, compared with 81% of patients with 12 years ofeducation and 85% of those with more than 12 years of education.

The team suggests that this finding could be related to the effect of education on job opportunities, income, housing, access to nutritious foods and health insurance.

"Higher levels of education also could directly affect health through greater knowledge acquired during schooling and greater empowerment and self-efficacy," explain the researchers. "Education is strongly associated with health literacy, which in turn affects one's ability to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions."

Writing in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings, Dr Roger and team conclude: "These data confirm the socioeconomic disparities in health after myocardial infarction [heart attack]."