[Documentation of the death certificate for stillborn infants/infants dying before 1 year of age].

The analysis of 311 death certificates of stillbirths and live born under one year of age covering the period from 1979 to 1984 and the analysis of the clinical dates referring to revealed: a high frequency of mistakes both in the nondiagnostic and in the diagnostic part, the handling of the documents was not in correspondence with the law, the number of mistakes in the nondiagnostic part has decreased, obstetricians made more mistakes than pediatrists, physicians with great experience in the field of death certificates made less mistakes, the number of secundinae to be morphologically investigated was to low and the possibility of corrections of the cause of death was not made use of. To improve the situation recommendations are given.