Co-operation of Local Boards of Health: Dr. Baker moved that the Secretary be requested to invite the co-operation of the city boards of health of Cleveland and Toledo in the proposed Immigrant-Inspection Service; to which request Dr. Thornton moved that a special invitation be extended to the health officer of the State of Texas to co-operate in the work of this COUNCIL. Adopted. Sundry Resolutions Adopted: Dr. Salomon offered sundry resolutions, which were duly adopted, tendering the thanks of the CoOUNCIL to Dr. J. J. Speed, for the able manner in which he has presided at the meetings of this COUNCIL; to Dr. J. H. Rauch for his untiring efforts in promoting its welfare and extending its usefulness; to the railroad companies for facilities to the members; and to the management of the Cairo operahouse for its kindness in placing at the disposal of the COUNCIL the free use of that building. On motion of Dr. Rauch, the members of the COUNCIL were requested to send copies of the resolutions adopted at the present meeting to the individual members of their respective Congressional delegations, and to urge them to advance and support the projects therein named. On motion of Dr. Dibrell, the Executive Committee was authorized to call the next regular meeting of the COUNCIL at such time and place as, in its discretion, may seem necessary. On motion of Dr. Baker, the COUNCIL adjourned to the Cairo opera-house, to listen to the address of the retiring President, upon the "Necessity of National Control of the Prevention of the Introduction of Yellow Fever and Small-Pox into the United States." At the conclusion of the address Dr. Devron, president-elect, moved a vote of thanks to its author, Dr. John J. Speed, and the COUNCIL requested a copy for publication. The Fourth Annual Meeting of the COUNCIL then adjourned sine die. MORTALITY STATISTICS AND NOMENCLATURE OF DISEASES. DURING the year an effort has again been made to secure the returns of marriages, births and deaths, which Section 8 of the State Board of Health Act requires county clerks to render to the Secretary of the STATE BOARD OF HEALTH, annually, and at such other times as the BOARD may direct. Forms for these returns were prepared and distributed, together with the following instructions for compiling the Condensed Returns of Deaths: So many synonyms and equivalents are used by physicians to describe the same disease, that a blank which should contain all of them would be unwieldy and confusing. In the blank prepared by the Secretary for the CoNdensed RETURN OF DEATHS, a list of 175 titles is given, duly classified, but numbered consecutively. These numbers are the key to the proper compilation of the CONDENSED RETURN. For convenience, this list of titles is reprinted herein in two forms-First, as it appears on the CONDENSED RETURN blank, with the consecutive numbers preceding the titles (see CLASSIFIED LIST OF CAUSES OF DEATH). Second, in alphabetical order, each title followed by the same number which it bears on the CONDENSED RETURN (see ALPHABETICAL LIST OF CAUSES OF DEATH). To these two is added a LIST OF SYNONYMS AND EQUIVALENTS, also arranged alphabetically, and each title followed by the number of its corresponding title on the CONDENSED RETURN. This LIST OF SYNONYMS has been compiled after examining the titles of Causes of Dath in over 65,000 cases-including every death returned in one county during four and a-half years. The labor was undertaken, and the examination made, in order to become practically acquainted with the difficulties which a non-professional would encounter in attempting to tabulate and arrange returns made by nearly 6,000 physicians, of different schools, adhering to various systems of classification and nomenclature, and often using local or idiomatic terms in their certificates. Even a medical man might be excused for not knowing that angina maligna, angina membrana, croupous diphtheria, cynanche maligna, diphtheritic sore throat, malignant diphtheria, putrid fever, putrid sore throat, sloughing sore throat-were all to be returned under the title DIPHTHERIA (No. 8); or that bold hives, cynanche trachealis, laryngitis membranacea, diphtheritis trachealis and CROUP (No. 93), are one and the same thing. Clearly, then, it would be idle to expect a non-medical man to compile correct returns from Certificates assigning such a diversity of nominal causes of death. Hence this attempt to simplify the matter by the appended lists. INSTRUCTIONS. It is recommended that the compiler first take the REGISTER OF DEATHS and enter in the first left-hand column in red ink the number of the title of the Cause of Death in each case-ascertaining this number by reference, first. to the Alphabetical List, and if the title be not found therein, then by reference to the LIST OF SYNONYMS. Thus, the Cause of Death being given by the physician as Enteric fever, reference to the Alphabetical List shows Enteric fever to be numbered 12. Enter, therefore, the number 12 in red ink in the first left-hand column of the REGISTER record of such a case. In another instance, the Cause of Death being given as Typhoid fever, and this title not being found in the Alphabetical List, the LIST OF SYNONYMS must be consulted, and there it will be found that Typhoid fever is also numbered 12, (it being a synonym for Enteric fever,) and the record of the case will, therefore, be red-ink numbered in like man ner. Having completed the numbering of the REGISTER in this manner, the next step will be to take one set of Form 90, and, by dots or strokes in the proper spaces opposite the number of the Cause of Death, check off from the REGISTER each item of Form 90. The following illustrations may assist to a better understanding of the method. Only those entries in the REGISTER, which are necessary for the CONDENSED RETURN, are given in these illustrations. The full-faced figures in the first left-hand column represent the red-ink figures corresponding with the name of the cause of death on Form 90. |