The number of deaths from severe heart attacks following hospital treatment has nearly halved in six years, Scottish researchers revealed last night.

The study, the largest of its kind, also found a dramatic reduction in the long-term health impact of attacks due to medical advances.

It is the first time an emergency treatment regime has been shown to cut the risk of on-going heart failure afterwards. Professor Keith Fox, one of the lead researchers, said the study showed people no longer needed to be as frightened of suffering a heart attack.

However, Scots still have the highest death rates from heart disease in the UK, with 10,000 people dying from the condition last year.

The study is the result of work a team at Edinburgh University began with hospitals in Scotland and a number of other countries in 1999.

They presented centres with the best available evidence on how to look after heart attack victims and information about how their own patients were faring.

Now the results of the project, which includes analysis of the outcomes for 44,372 patients admitted to 113 hospitals in 14 countries with heart attacks or unstable angina, have been published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). It reveals that between 1999 and 2006 death rates among patients admitted with a severe heart attack, where the arteries were completely blocked, reduced from 8.4% to 4.5%. It also shows their risk of new heart failure nearly halved with a reduction from 20% to 11%.

That means for every 1000 patients presenting themselves to hospital there were 39 fewer deaths and 90 fewer patients with new heart failure.

Mr Fox, British Heart Foundation professor of cardiology at Edinburgh University, said: "Perhaps the most exciting finding here is preventing new heart failure, because patients with heart failure have a huge amount of disability.

"The heart muscle becomes baggy and does not work as well... they get fatigued, do not sleep well, they have a very poor quality of life and indeed risk losing their life.

"Many programmes have tried to prevent new heart failure. This is the first large-scale programme that has really shown that in patients."

The hospitals involved in the study were encouraged to use treatments such as clot-busting drugs and perform procedures to re-open clogged arteries in line with best practice guidelines. Evidence on the best drug regimes to prevent further complications was also provided.

Mr Fox said: "We are trying to get away from the idea of a wonder drug. We are saying, here is a way - by taking the best evidence that we have and applying it - that it can make a difference to our patients."

Hospitals across South East Scotland, including Borders, Fife and Stirling, were involved in the study.

Medical centres in the United States, Canada, France, Germany, Belgium, Spain and Poland also participated.

Deaths in patients admitted with milder forms of heart attacks, where the artery was not completely blocked, also reduced, from 2.9% to 2.2%.

Professor Peter Weissberg, medical director at the British Heart Foundation (BHF), said: "This is a great example of why long-term investment in heart research is vital.

"The study shows that fewer people are dying, and fewer are developing debilitating heart failure thanks to research evidence prompting these hospitals to improve the way they treat people with heart disease.

"Every day, heart patients are benefiting from research made possible partly by generous public donations to the BHF."