International trends in cardiovascular diseases in the elderly.

The only available statistical data on cardiovascular diseases which are relatively reliable and internationally comparable are those on mortality. Cardiovascular diseases constitute the leading cause of death in the elderly, especially in industrialized countries. In recent years, the majority of these countries have recorded a decreasing trend in cardiovascular mortality in the elderly as well as in younger people. Data on morbidity are not sufficiently standardized to allow international comparisons, and even within a country chronologically comparable statistical series rarely exist, especially population-based data. The U.S.A. and Japan, two of the countries which have maintained such data series and which have registered the most rapid mortality decline, do not show similar improvements in the morbidity level for cardiovascular diseases. Cardiovascular diseases, therefore, seem to continue to impose a great burden on society in general and on the elderly population in particular, despite some improvements in survival.