Auscultation of the Heart by Machine and by Physicians

Abstract

An automatic screening device for auscultatory evi-dence of heart disease was tested on 308 children and adolescents who had previously had rheumatic fever. The device correctly recognized as abnormal 88.5% of 131 patients with rheumatic heart disease (RHD), and correctly recognized as normal 83.6% of 177 patients with no RHD. For purposes of comparison a cardiologist, an internist, and a senior medical student each listened while blindfolded to the heart sounds of three 100-patient subsets of the above population.

Mass Screening of School Children for Heart Disease: During 1 School Year in Sacramento, Calif., 3,518 Children Were Screened with the Use of a Portable Analog-Digital Computer

“…MASS SCREENING programs for the detection of heart disease in children have been conducted since 1959 (1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6). Recently such programs have been facilitated by the use of the PhonoCardioScan (A), a portable analogdigital computer (6)(7)(8). However, although much has been written about the "delabeling" of children with innocent murmurs, to our knowledge no effort has been made to carry this out in mass screening programs.…”