How Does Your Hospital Use the Intensive Care Unit for Stable NSTEMI Patients?

The introduction of the cardiac care unit transformed the care of patients with an acute myocardial infarction (MI). However, in recent decades, acute MI and its treatment have undergone much change, with marked reductions in mortality rates and, for many people, less need for advanced critical care services. Still, it is far from clear how best to allocate intensive care services for these patients. Previous studies have shown substantial variation in intensive care unit (ICU) use by hospitals for patients with MI.

To provide more information about this issue, investigators made use of a large registry (Acute Coronary Treatment and Intervention Outcomes Network Registry — Get With the Guidelines) to examine variation in ICU utilization for …