| Summary: | This study is an attempt to set forth the extent and causation of disease and death as seen amongst the northern section of the Kikuyu tribe of East Africa. It consists of an analysis of figures and information obtained in the course of routine medical practice in the hospitals and dispensaries of the three medical agencies at work in the South Nyeri District which is the northernmost district of. the Kikuyu country. The period covered by the studs is the ten years from 1944 to 1953. The thesis is divided into three main parts. The first part consists of three sections of introductory material. The second part is composed of two sections in which the morbidity of the district is analysed. The first section of this part is concerned with the total figures of sickness (excluding maternity) seen at all the medical stations in the district during the ten years. The second section is an analysis of the morbidity by diseases (including maternity) derived from the experience of one of the three hospitals of the district, namely Tumutumu Hospital. The third and final part of the thesis considers the incidence and causation of the deaths which occurred in all the three hospitals of the district during the decade under review. The period of this review was chiefly determined by the availability. of medical records. Unfortunately no local medical records prior to the year 1944 exist in the offices of the Medical Department at Nyeri, and this determined the year in which our study could begin. Also the case records of Tumutumu Hospital are not complete before the year 1942. The destruction of such valuable statistical material is a matter for regret. My own experience of medical work in South Nyeri District is confined to the years 1947, and 1951 to 1955. During these years I worked at Tumutumu Hospital which, along with its associated dispensaries, is run by the Church of Scotland Mission. The hospital of the Roman Catholic Mission is variously known as the Consolata Hospital and Mathari Hospital. The latter name should not te confused with that of the Mathari Mental Hospital of the Government Medical Department in Nairobi. The age and disease categories used in this thesis are those of the Sixth Revision of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases, Injuries and Causes of Death (1948).
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