Gender and race appear to play a role in the treatment and outcome of acute coronary syndromes (ACS) such as heart attacks or unstable angina, two studies reveal.

In the first study, Dr John Spertus, from the University of Missouri-Kansas City in the USA, and colleagues tracked more than 1000 White patients with ACS who were treated at one of two US hospitals.

They found that, after a year although death rates were similar among Black and White patients, at around 7%, interviews conducted in most of the participants showed that Blacks were more likely to have angina than Whites along with a worse quality of life and poorer physical function.

"These are the first data to find clinically important differences in the health status of Black and White patients after ACS treatment and provide new insights into racial disparities in care and outcomes," the researchers believe.

In the second study, Dr Sonia Anand (McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada) and colleagues studied gender differences among heart patients participating in a large clinical trial.

They found that women were less likely than men to undergo a technique used to image the arteries known as coronary angiography, although interestingly women receiving angiography were twice as likely to have normal coronary arteries.

The lesser use of the diagnostic procedure did not, however, appear to be because women were less likely to have cardiac disease, as women who were highly likely to have suffered a cardiac event were no more likely to be referred for the procedure than those at low risk.

In an editorial accompanying the studies in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, Dr Rita Redberg, from the University of California in San Francisco, USA, comments: "The articles in this issue of the Journal again confirm that there are racial- and gender-based disparities in cardiovascular care, and their conclusions leave us with several areas for future exploration."