Risk for myocardial infarction (MI) appears elevated in the first week after influenza diagnosis, according to a study in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Using Ontario health databases, researchers studied some 360 hospitalizations for acute MI that occurred within 1 year before to 1 year after a laboratory-confirmed flu diagnosis. There were 20 MI admissions per week within the first week after respiratory specimen collection for flu testing, versus 3.3 per week for the remainder of the study period — translating to a sixfold higher MI risk in the week after flu diagnosis. No risk increase was seen beyond 7 days after flu diagnosis.