SANITARY STATISTICS
Author: Dimitar Bratovanov
This manual is based, principally, on the works "zemska" statistics from the 80s and 90s of the 19th century in Russia. Widely cited are some russian statisticians - E. A. Ossipov, F. F. Erismann, Y. E. Yanson, P. I. Kurkin, etc. Most of those authors are members from the Pirogov's Association for Medical Advancement, after the name of the great russian surgeon Prof. Nikolay Pirogov /1810-1881/. Within their scope is: 1. Establishing grounds for morbidity registration in the country; 2. Introduction of statistical methods in hygiene education; 3. Beginning for a socialized medical science, where, statistics plays the role of a torchlight. In the long run those are the fundamentals, which, after the Great October Socialist Revolution /1917/ give the roots for a strong and centralized state statistical organization, namely - "Gosudarstvenoe Statisticheskoe Upravlenie" /GSU/. The author of this book, himself, is a bulgarian - but he was sometime a student from those statistical circles and is contemporary with some of the leaders of post-war soviet medical science. The bulgarians remember a number of eminent soviet scientists, who, in the difficult post-war period helped to rebuild the National Health Service on socialist grounds. Enough is to give the names of the scholars G. A. Batkis, B. Y. Smulevich and others.
Otherwise, the book is an interesting mixture of classical statistical methods with sovietized methodology, which, nonetheless is a helpful reader despite of its timely outdate. Given are articles from popular works of V. I. Lenin, for example, on statistics:
"We need not a naked ciphers, but, full of matter medical reports … which, could arm us for better applied work and more. Thus, medical statistics is a breathing source for health functionaries"
Going on with the statistical database, important is to know that behind the numerical data lie a whole multitude of phenomenon and facts. Consequently, having a ruler is a prerequisite and a negative approach often leads to what the french people call "mensonge en chiffres".
In Bulgaria traditions of sanitary statistics are scarce. First enumeration of the general population is done 1880, after the Liberation. Before that a data exist from the turkish "salname" or yearbooks, themselves, nor accurate and regularly collected. First systematical works on statistics of population /"demography'/ is presented by M. K. Sarafov, G. T. Danailov, D. Michaikov, P. Kiranov, etc. First "Directorate of Statistics" is created year 1887. Until 1947 "Sector of Health Statistics" was separate from Ministry of Health. In the mainstream sanitary-statistical information was provided, according sanitary laws, by the district and municipal physicians and by physicians on private practice. The book provides a valuable apparatus of health data and a good literature index. However, more research is needed for compilation of a reliable database in morbidity and mortality statistics in Bulgaria.
CONTENTS
Introduction
Part one: Basic Statistics
Chapter 1: Short history of statistics
Chapter 2: Main nomenclature of statistics
Chapter 3: Characteristics, organization, plan and forms of statistical observation
Chapter 4: Statistical development of crude data
Chapter 5: Statistical development of transformed data
Chapter 6: Graphical methods in statistical study
Chapter 7: Trends
Chapter 8: Measurment of associations
Part two: Special Sanitary Statistics
Chapter 1: Definition and origins of demography
Chapter 2: Nuptiality statistics
Chapter 3: Natality statistics
Chapter 4: Mortality statistics
Chapter 5: Infant mortality
Chapter 6: Causes for death. Death index in Bulgaria
Chapter 7: Life-table statistics
Chapter 8: Natural increase and recreation
Chapter 9: Morbidity statistics
Chapter 10: Antropometrical statistics
Literature
