2013 Volume 29 Issue 5 Pages 212-217
Half a century has passed since the beginning of school-based electrocardiographic cardiovascular (CV) screening in Japan. This screening in children and adolescents who have life-threatening CV diseases might be able to prevent sudden cardiac death. Our knowledge has grown and many premises of pediatric cardiology have been renewed by findings from this screening. Only Japan has established a nation-wide CV screening system. However, these facts are not known outside of Japan. This implies that we (members of the Japanese Society of Pediatric Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery) have not provided sufficient information regarding the academic, social, and cost-effectiveness of this system. The author considers that this screening system needs to be improved. We need to continuously provide information concerning data from the electrocardiographic CV screening system.
