Mortality trends for chronic nephritis and infections of the kidney: A clinical and statistical comparison between mortality in New Haven, Connecticut and the United States, 1950–1960

The hypothesis is tested that, for the United States, in the absence of changes in diagnostic criteria, the combined death rates for chronic nephritis and infections of the kidney between 1950 and 1960 should have remained constant. The study population consisted of all residents of New Haven, Connecticut who died in New Haven during the triennia 1949–1951 and 1959–1961 from the underlying causes of chronic nephritis and infections of the kidney (ISC 592–594, 600) ( N = 99). All available clinical and autopsy records from the two major New Haven hospitals were abstracted. No significant change between the triennia was observed in diagnostic practice or in mortality even though in the United States as a whole mortality from these conditions have shown a marked decline. The data support the hypothesis that the decline in the combined rates between 1950 and 1960 in the U.S. was due primarily to alteration in diagnostic habits.