The success of a North-East town in reducing heart disease deaths is being copied all over the country.

Premature deaths from heart disease have plummeted in Darlington, leading to the so-called "Darlington" model of running heart services being adopted in increasing numbers of places.

New figures show there has been a 22 per cent drop in deaths from circulatory disease in just three years, one of the best results in the UK.

A health conference in Darlington heard that the figures are being put down to a combination of factors in primary and secondary care. The number of deaths from heart disease in Darlington fell from 164 per 100,000 in 1998 to 128 in 2001.

Officials from Darlington Primary Care Trust said factors which had helped to reduce heart-related deaths included: These include pioneering initiatives such as: lA cardiac rehabilitation service; The first rapid access chest pain clinic in the North; A one-stop heart failure clinic run by a specialist nurse; Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) screening services; A heart failure diagnostic clinic; Regular CHD patient reviews; Good use of prescribing including aspirin and the heart superdrugs, statins.

Dr Ahmet Fuat, Darlington PCT's clinical lead on coronary heart disease(CHD) said: "Darlington can boast many firsts in CHD care some of which are being recognised as models of excellence nationally. We are ahead of the game in most CHD areas.

Consultant cardiologist at Darlington Memorial Hospital Jerry Murphy added: "There has been an important reduction in premature deaths from heart disease. They have dropped massively."

He said at the current rate Darlington would easily surpass national targets and should have reduced premature deaths from heart disease by 40 per cent by 2006 - four years earlier than the Government goal.

Positive news about a reduction in premature deaths off-sets concerns that heart patients in the region are still waiting too long for diagnostic tests.

While the average wait for a routine heart bypass has dropped from 18 months to around four months, a shortage of angiography units means that heart patients still have to wait around six months to find out whether they need surgery.

New diagnostic angiography units are planned for Darlington, Durham and Hartlepool.