Editorial

The ultimate goal of all cardiovascular clinical research should be to reduce the morbidity and mortality from cardiovascular diseases at an acceptable cost. In no area of medicine has clinical research led to a greater change in medical care than in the management of acute myocardial infarction (AMI). We now try to accomplish early coronary reperfusion in all ST-elevation MIs and administer a combi-nation of drugs in the postinfarction period to halt or slow the progressive remodeling process that leads to heart failure and shortened survival.1 Clinical trials have documented the dra-matic efficacy of these therapeutic interventions on morbidity and mortality.2–5 Article see p 2577 The old nontherapeutic approach was not so long ago. During my internship in Boston in 1956, my first admission was a middle-aged man with an acute transmural anterior wal