Almost one-third - or 29.9 per cent - of patients had an initial diagnosis which differed from their final diagnosis.
The study, carried out by Leeds University researchers, is based on the UK national heart attack register and looked at nearly 600,000 heart attack patients over the course of nine years.
Researcher Dr Chris Gale noted that an initial misdiagnosis can have "potentially important clinical repercussions, including an increased risk of death."
The study, carried out between April 2004 and March 2013, involves 243 NHS hospitals in England and Wales which cared for patients who were aged between 18 to 100 years old when they were admitted. Researchers found that 198,534 patients were initially misdiagnosed.
Heart attacks can be broken down into two main types - called Stemi and Nstemi - according to the British Heart Foundation (BHF) which part-funded the study.
A Stemi attack occurs when there is a total blockage of the main artery that pumps oxygenated blood around the body. The more common Nstemi type of heart attack involves a partial blockage of one or more arteries. Both result in serious damage to the heart muscle.
Women who had a final diagnosis of Stemi had a 59 per cent greater chance of a misdiagnosis compared with men, according to the study which appears in the European Heart Journal: Acute Cardiovascular Care.
Women who had a final diagnosis of Nstemi had a 41 per cent greater chance of a misdiagnosis when compared with men.
The BHF's associate medical director Dr Mike Knapton described the differences in diagnosis as "alarmingly high" but said that better tests are being developed for female heart attack diagnoses.
He noted that when different limits are applied to the troponin test, a routine test for a heart attack, more women receive a correct diagnosis.
Dr Knapton said: "However, this new study highlights the current scale of the issue and confirms more research is urgently needed into tests that will enable earlier and more accurate diagnosis of a heart attack, particularly in women."
Up to 28,000 women die from heart attacks each year in the UK, according to BHF estimates. There are also around 275,000 female heart attack survivors in the UK.
The longer a heart attack is left undiagnosed and untreated, the more the heart muscle can be irreversibly damaged.
