In reviewing the literature on diaphragmatic hernia, it may be noted that the condition was discovered only seven times in 25,000 roentgenologic examinations, according to the separate reports of Beclere,1 MacMillan,2 and Rendich.3 The Mayo Clinic records finding twenty cases up to July, 1924, or one in about every 18,000 patients examined. According to Carman,4 fifteen of these were found in the years 1923 and 1924. Richards5 has tabulated 137 cases taken from the literature from 1900 to 1923. These were all nontraumatic and of the esophageal variety. It is worthy of note that up until 1923 only forty-seven cases had been diagnosed during life.
While these figures would create the impression that the condition is rare, this is not the case. The more general employment of the roentgen ray with its recent advances in diagnosis makes it apparent that diaphragmatic hernia has frequently been overlooked in the past. Morrison,6