Regarding the methodology, two main sources of information are used to identify events: death records from official mortality (National Institute of Statistics-Istat) and hospital discharge records-HDR.

 

Combining this data, and using the total duration of hospitalization, it is possible to identify suspected fatal and non-fatal coronary and cerebrovascular events (potential events). A subsample of these events is validated by using MONICA standardized diagnostic criteria, in order to elaborate the Positive Predictive Values (PPVs). PPVs are applied to potential events to estimate current events, which are related to the resident population. In this way it is possible to obtain the estimated attack rates. Case fatality rates are estimated as the ratio of fatal events and total events.

 

Procedures and methodology of the registration system and validation are described in the study protocol (pdf 2.2 Mb) and the manual of operations (pdf 1.8 Mb).

 

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• Coronary and cerebrovascular events surveillance
• Longitudinal studies
• Population registers
• Background