THE UNCONTROLLABLE CAUSES OF DEATH IN DIABETIC COMA

Abstract

The vital statistics of New York City show that the standardized death rate of diabetes has risen from 17.3 per hundred thousand in 1901 to 27.9 per hundred thousand in 1931. The introduction of insulin in 1923 was accompanied by a slight recession in mortality which has since been entirely lost. The beneficial effect of insulin has been manifested only in the lower age periods up to 35 years. From 35 to 44 years the curve has flattened out and above that age the diabetic death rate, particularly in women, has sharply risen. The cause of this increasing mortality despite the use of insulin is today the subject of widespread investigation from which no definite conclusions can as yet be drawn. I have therefore undertaken an analysis of the cases of diabetic coma in the adult wards of the Mount Sinai Hospital for the insulin period 1923-1933 in the hope