OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the inpatient and outpatient maintenance costs associated with treatment for acute myocardial infarction in the Greek NHS. METHODS: A database from a large NHS University Hospital was employed and analyzed. Resource consumption data were combined with 2003 price data to compute overall treatment costs. Inpatient costs of an uncomplicated AMI comprise all costs associated with treating an event in-hospital and these include the costs of wards, PTCAs, medications, cardiac ICU, etc. The marginal costs of having one of many types of events, such as strokes, re-infarction, etc, are also computed. The outpatient maintenance costs of patients include medication taken after the AMI for certain period or life-time, visits to professionals and rehabilitation in cases of events such as strokes. RESULTS: The costs of initial inpatient medication given is between €790 and €1000. The average cost of hospitalization is about €8.474 and the additional cost per event is as follows: stroke-€1300, bleeding-€90, reinfraction-€1125, recurrent ischemia:0, CHF-€561, hypotention: 0, cardiogenic chock-€1.730, electromechanical dissociation-€121, tamponate or cardiac rapture-€279, second degree atrioventicular block-€961, third degree atrioventicular block: €1.521, artial fibrillation: €100, asystole: €121, acute mitral requirgitation-€1.415, septal defect: €415, anaphylaxis:€300, pulmonary embolism: €2.050, arrythmias:€100, hypotention: €0, pericarditis-€100. The cost of rehabilitation and maintenance is on average €915 in the first year plus €4.5 per day after discharge and during lifetime thereafter. Severe stroke is associated with an extra of €1.000 in the first year. CONCLUSION: AMI is an expensive to treat event. The cost of initial medication given is low in comparison with the total treatment cost within the hospital and after discharge. The associated events are also very expensive to treat and multiply total cost. Any reduction therefore in MI's, given the high prevalence, will save the NHS and the taxpayer a lot of money.