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ABSTRACT. In 497 consecutive cases of fatal or non‐fatal primary myocardial infarction and sudden coronary death, occurring on the area of Helsinki city, survival and reinfarction rates during 3 years after the attack were analyzed in relation to the level of off‐the‐job and on‐the‐job physical activity of the victims prior to the attack. High previous on‐the‐job physical activity had no influence on the survival and reinfarction rate after the primary acute ischaemic attack. High off‐the‐job physical activity consisting of sports or heavy work at least 4 hours weekly (24 cases) was associated with significantly lower overall and coronary mortality during two first years after onset of the primary attack as compared with medium‐level (187 cases) or low‐level (286 cases) physical activity. The difference was apparent already during the early hours of the attack. In subjects with high‐ vs. low‐level previous leisure‐time physical activity the respective first day survival figures were 88 and 75%, the 2 years figures 88 and 62%, and the 3 years figures 75 and 58%. Previous cardiovascular diseases particularly hypertension, as well as previous heavy smoking in earlier asymptomatic men, worsened the prognosis. There were no significant differences in reinfarction rate between subjects with different previous physical activity, but there was a trend to higher reinfarction rate in the group of high physical activity and to lower rate in the low‐activity group. The findings support the view, that previous high leisure‐time physical activity consisting of sports of heavy work at least four hours weekly possess in cases of the first acute myocardial infarction some fatality reducing power, which probably operates over two years after the attack.
Siltanen et al. (Tue,) studied this question.