An Electrocardiographic and Autopsy Study of Coronary Heart Disease in the Navajo

¹ The Lovelace Foundation for Medical Education and Research and the Lovelace Clinic, Albuquerque; the Navajo Medical Center, Fort Defiance, Arizona, and the Bataan Memorial Methodist and Bernalillo County-Indian Hospitals, Albuquerque.

This study was designed to assess more accurately the prevalence of coronary heart disease among the Navajo. From the data presented, it seems that the prevalence of the disease is less by a factor of four or more than that in a comparable age group, namely that group of individuals 31 years of age or older.

The method of approach involved studies of electrocardiographic and autopsy records of Navajo and white hospital in-patients.

Electrocardiographic evidence in this study suggests a lower incidence of coronary artery disease in the Navajo than in the white control group. The pattern of acute myocardial infarction was certainly more frequently seen in the white patients. The differences observed between the two groups in regard to changes diagnostic or suggestive of old infarctions was not as striking.

The autopsy data are considered to be highly significant and indicate a much lower prevalence of coronary heart disease in the Navajo than in a white control group.