Regulatory Changes for the Treatment of Patients With Heart Attacks

This editorial discusses the urgent need to reform the regulatory system that currently impedes treatment for patients with heart attacks. Existing regulations and practices often direct ambulances carrying patients with heart attacks to under-equipped facilities, and the absence of necessary advertising guidelines results in hospitals without the latest lifesaving technologies intentionally misdirecting patients to their facilities through misleading marketing. As a result, patients die needlessly. Two congressional responses are recommended in this editorial to address this national public health crisis. First, Congress should enact legislation similar to that which it created for trauma care, resulting in patients in need of critical cardiac care being directed to the most appropriate, not merely the closest, facility. Second, Congress should enact legislation that would make Medicare participation conditional on hospitals’ following guidelines on how they may advertise their ability to treat patients with heart attacks. In conclusion, Congress should act to save the lives of patients with heart attacks currently being lost as a consequence of regulatory and market failures.