Rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease in children below the age of 5 years in the tropics.

Abstract

It is shown that rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease are not so rare in the tropics as has previously been supposed. Of 1,000 juvenile patients seen in the course of 4 years, 68 were below age 5, and 26 of these below age 4. Poor living conditions may account for the prevalence of streptococcal sore throat in these young children and in other members of their families. Rheumatic mitral incompetence was more common in these younger children than in the whole series.