Sudden death of the young with cardiovascular diseases.

Sudden death due to cardiovascular diseases was studied in 142 children who died suddenly during the period from 1969 to 1981. The age-distribution analysis showed that death occurred most frequently in infancy and it decreased with age. The subjects were divided into 7 groups, of which the hypoxemic group, consisting of 45 cases (32%), was the largest, followed by the congestive heart failure (CHF) group (33 cases, 23%), the primary endomyocardial disease (PMD)-coronary heart disease (CorHD) group (21 cases, 15%), the postoperative group (18 cases, 13%), the pulmonary vascular obstruction group (17 cases, 12%), the arrhythmia group of 3 cases and the miscellaneous group of the remaining cases. In the hypoxemic, CHF and arrhythmia groups, the majority of the cases were infants, while in the other groups the cases were distributed among all age groups. The relative incidence of each group showed that non-surgical and inoperable cases and postoperative cases increased with age and this increase has occurred in the last few years. This change has been brought about by the recent advances in medical and surgical treatments for infants with congenital heart diseases. It is hoped that in the future the number of cases which are too late for treatment will decrease further.