Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-9pm4c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-30T03:56:32.834Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Diarrhoea and enteritis amongst infants in the London area, 1930–8

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 May 2009

G. Payling Wright  and
Helen Payling Wright
G. Payling Wright
Affiliation:
From the Department of Pathology, Guy's Hospital Medical School
Helen Payling Wright
Affiliation:
From the Department of Pathology, Guy's Hospital Medical School
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The present inquiry was undertaken to obtain some indication of the relative frequencies of deaths amongst infants from the various forms of diarrhoea and enteritis—‘neonatal’, ‘parenteral’ and ‘infectious’—in the Greater London area in the decade before the war. Since much of the material needed for such an analysis was not available in the published records, a sampling inquiry, making use of the more elaborate records maintained by the Medical Officer of Health, was undertaken for the Borough of Willesden. A comparison of the relevant epidemiological and social conditions in this borough with those in the Greater London area as a whole showed, that for such a purpose, it might properly be regarded as a representative sample.

There was little evidence for the occurrence of the neonatal form in Willesden during the period studied, nor did the seasonal distribution of the deaths suggest that many took place in consequence of preceding parenteral infections. On the other hand, there did seem to be some evidence that a significant proportion of these deaths were in some degree associated with one another, in time or place or both, and it is suggested that this distribution might have resulted from the widespread dissemination in the community of one or more strains of some common micro-organism of relatively low virulence for all but the infant population.

A less detailed study of data for other London boroughs, viz., Bermondsey, Croydon, East Ham, Tottenham and West Ham, supported the main conclusion reached from the Willesden records.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Hygiene , Volume 44 , Issue 6 , September 1946 , pp. 480 - 490
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1946

References

REFERENCES

von Bortkiewicz, L. (1898). Das Gesetz der kleinen Zahlen. Leipzig.Google Scholar
Buice, W. A., Sehested, H. C. & Dienst, R. B. (1927). J. Infect. Dis. 40, 348.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, R. A. & Cunningham, A. A. (1941). Arch. Dis. Childh. 16, 211.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chapin, C. V. (1916). Sources and Modes of Infection, 2nd ed. New York.Google Scholar
Crowley, N., Downie, A. W., Fulton, F. & Wilson, G. S. (1941). Lancet, 2, 590.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davis, H. T. (1941). The Analysis of Economic Time Series. Bloomington, Illinois.Google Scholar
Frant, S. & Abramson, H. (1944). Brennemann's Practice of Pediatrics, 1. Hageratown, Maryland.Google Scholar
Greenwood, M. & Yule, G. U. (1920). J. Roy. Statist. Soc. 83, 255.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kendall, M. G. (1941–1942). Biometrika, 32, 1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keynes, J. M. (1921). A Treatise on Probability. London.Google Scholar
Menzies, M. F. (1942). Lancet, 2, 35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
von Mises, R. (1939). Probability, Statistics and Truth. London.Google Scholar
Mitman, M. (1936). Ann. Rep. L.C.C. 4, pt. III, p. 76.Google Scholar
Parr, L. W. (1936). Science, 83, 189.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Patterson, W. H. & Smith, G. S. (1944). Brit. Med. J. 2, 659.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rice, J. L., Best, W. H., Frant, S. & Abramson, H. (1937). J. Amer. Med. Ass. 109, 475.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smellie, J. M. (1939). Lancet, 1, 969.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wallick, H. & Stuart, C. A. (1943). J. Bact. 45, 121.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wishart, D. E. S. (1930). J. Amer. Med. Ass. 95, 1084.CrossRefGoogle Scholar