importantly it also looks at the role of specific health system characteristics and policies to determine their importance in explaining crosscountry variation in the quality of cvd acute care it examines crosscountry variation in recommended heart failure practice and analyses whether the degree of adherence can be explained by health system characteristics and policies these data provide a comprehensive picture of health care expenditure health care use and resources lifestyles and risk factors health care quality and health outcomes the statistics that relate directly to cvd and diabetes care and outcomes provide the basis for the statistical analysis presented in this report