A series of 2,066 consecutive autopsies performed by the staff of the department of pathology of the Medical College of the State of South Carolina from Jan. 1, 1928 through May 1938 has been reviewed by us as a statistical study of cardiovascular disease in the South, particularly among American Negroes. Instances of trauma to the heart or vessels have been excluded, but all other cases are included.
During this period all the autopsies done in the County of Charleston were performed by a member of this staff, including investigations authorized by the coroner in cases of sudden death. Furthermore, since most of the cases prior to about 1935 were from the charity services of the Roper Hospital—a general county hospital for white persons and Negroes—there has been little or no migration of patients, and the results as given here can be taken as representative of fatal cardiovascular disease in