No abstract

TO KEEP ABREAST of changes in the characteristics of a population with regard to pregnancies and newborns and to keep public health programs in this area geared to these changes, it is desirable and helpful to collect and study comprehensive statistics with which to measure and evaluate these changes and the program needs which they entail. A simple and inexpensive method of collecting source data for such statistics is through the addition of a medical supplement to the birth certificate. Yet, this method has not gained intensive application because it has been found that the data so collected are often incomplete and inaccurate and because it has not been demonstrated convincingly that the data are of practical value for program purposes. This paper describes our more recent experience in the District of Columbia with the collection of comprehensive data on a medical supplement and with the utilization of statistics derived therefrom. The experience to be reported is that of an urban community having some 33,000 live births a year. A medical supplement to the birth certificate has been used in the District of Columbia since 1940. Little was done with this material until special resources became available for a comprehensive study of the 1952 birth certificate data. The methodology and findings of this study have been reported by Oppenheimer, et al.,' and the 1952 data used in this paper have been taken from that report. * A standing advisory committee of representatives of the obstetric and pediatric groups in the community participated in the revisions of the medical supplement and in promoting reporting thereon.

No abstract

If you get acquainted with the numbers characterizing the medical healthcare institutions in Germany and their work, judging about medicine and healthcare in Germany by external signs and digital indicators, you get the impression of great well-being and a flourishing state.