A Proposal for Reclassifying Causes of Death in Transylvania (1850–1920): The HCDT System

Abstract

Our research explores issues related to the process of classifying causes of death, using information from parish registers of burials included in the Historical Population Database of Transylvania (HPDT), and covering the period between 1850 and 1920. In the first phase, causes of death were subjected to several processes of standardization, English-language equivalence and accommodation according to the International Classification of Diseases, 10th Revision (ICD-10), a system often used in the field of historical demography. At a later stage, we developed a classification scheme suitable for the Transylvanian population in the past. Consequently, the Historical Causes of Death in Transylvania (HCDT) system has a narrower taxonomy, comprising only eight chapters with several subgroups, which take into the account the historical realities of Transylvania. Therefore, the HCDT system can be used as a research tool that meets the specific needs of historical demography and of the history of medicine, being also capable of providing pertinent answers to fundamental questions about historic mortality. The scheme proposed in our research could potentially be used for comparative analyses with other regions and historic populations.

Keywords

• causes of death
• parish registers
• HPDT
• classification
• ICD-10
• HCDT system