A Medical Social Study of Factors in Adjustment of Eight Cardiac Patients Over Sixty as Seen in the Cardiac Clinic of Jewish Memorial Hospital
Abstract
Two thousand years ago, the average length of life was twenty-five years. At the beginning of the twentieth century it was forty, and only one person in twenty-five lived to be sixty-five years of age or older. Today, the average life span is sixty-eight and it is estimated that sixteen out of twenty-five will live to the retirement age of sixty-five. Hence, an examination of statistics reveals that today more people are living beyond the age of sixty than ever before. The incidence and type of many diseases vary indirectly with that particular age group under discussion and consideration. This is particularly true with cardiac disease, wherein the prevalence of certain common types of heart disease increases sharply with the increment in the age of the individual patient group. Therefore, it follows that diseases prevalent in the older age, with its individual complex problems, would be on the increase. This is precisely what is occurring today. In addition to this, as medical science moves forward in the prevention and cure of infectious diseases, chronic illness has become one of the nation's foremost medical problems. Great advances in medicine and surgery have helped to bring chronic illness to the fore.
Subject Area
Biostatistics|Social work|Gerontology
Recommended Citation
Rummelsburg, Marilyn Gloria, "A Medical Social Study of Factors in Adjustment of Eight Cardiac Patients Over Sixty as Seen in the Cardiac Clinic of Jewish Memorial Hospital" (1951). ETD Collection for Fordham University. AAI30509521.
https://research.library.fordham.edu/dissertations/AAI30509521
