Unstable angina: prognosis of the individual patient.

Not all patients diagnosed with unstable angina have the same outcome. Thus, it is incumbent on the physician caring for these patients to try to identify factors that will risk-stratify them. These factors include the degree of coronary angiographic stenosis, the lesion morphology, severity of symptoms, presence or absence of transient myocardial ischemia, and state of left ventricular function. In addition, many other factors including the patient's age, gender, and coexisting medical disorders must be considered when trying to prognosticate an individual patient. Clinical experience indicates that clinical indices that combine information provided by all of the above related variables should have more powerful prognostic significance than any individual variable.