Corn Oil in Treatment of Ischaemic Heart Disease

Abstract

(3) Absence of heart failure, and also of any non-cardiac disease likely to threaten life within two years. (4) Absence of personal or geographical factors likely to interfere with clinic attendance or the taking of oil. When a new patient was accepted for the trial a sealed envelope was opened containing the allocation instructions. In the case of patients allocated to an oil group the instructions referred only to a code number. Thus the physicians in charge knew which patients were receiving oil, but they did not know until the end of the trial the kind of oil that they were receiving. All patients received conventional treatments, at the discre tion of the physicians. At the time when the trial started long-term anticoagulant therapy was seldom used. Later it became more popular, especially for patients suffering reinfarction. To avoid confusion by possible interactions between treatments a few patients already receiving this treat ment were excluded from entry to the trial ; and in addition the occurrence of infarction after entry was taken as an end point, the patient being then withdrawn from the trial. Patients in both oil groups were instructed to avoid fried