Fatal Myocardial Infarction: A Retrospective Autopsy Study

Introduction: Myocardial infarction is one of the complications of Coronary Artery Disease (CAD). Recent study has shown that the incidence of acute myocardial infarction is on the increase in developing countries such as Nigeria. Autopsy based studies have proven to be a reliable and valuable method for studying this disease. Aim: To determine the prevalence and morphological pattern of fatal myocardial infarction resulting from CAD in our center. Materials and Methods: This was an eight year (January 2008 to December 2015) retrospective study of all autopsy cases in which death was caused by myocardial infarction. The age, sex, percentage of occlusion of each artery, weight of the heart and evidence of old infarction and any accompanying illness were all recorded. Results: A total of 79 cases of myocardial infarction were seen out of 8334 autopsies. This represents 0.9%. The age ranged from 27 to 80 years with mean age of 57 +/- 10 years. Males and females constituted 22.8% and 77.2% respectively with a male to female ratio of 1: 3.4. The highest incidence of myocardial infarction occurred in the sixth decade while the lowest occurred before the third decade. The most common vessel involved was the Left Anterior Descending (LAD) coronary artery. Only 48.1% and 64.6 % of study population had accompanying old myocardial scars and hypertensive heart disease respectively. Fewer subjects had accompanying diabetes mellitus. Conclusion: A prevalence of 0.9% was seen in this study. We also observed more myocardial infarction in women than in men.