Paralysis Agitans Mortality in England and Wales, 1855-1962

The causes of death in England and Wales have been published in tabular form in the annual reports of the Registrar General since 1837 when Dr William Farr first applied statistical methods to the analysis of the English death roll. The classification of causes of death which Farr developed for this purpose (General Register Office, 1845) included the "shaking palsy", and deaths ascribed to this entity tabulated according to age and sex may be found in the annual reports for the years 1855 to 1880 inclu- sive. Farr's successor, William Ogle, introduced in 1881 an improved classification based on the new nomenclature of disease of the Royal College of Physicians of London (Idem, 1881). In the new nosology specific medical terms largely replaced the common or popular names previously employed; "6paralysis agitans" thus superseded the "shaking palsy". The Registrar General continued to publish the number of deaths assigned each year to this cause up to the year 1900. One notes with interest that Charcot (1880) and Sanders (1879) made reference to these reports in their clinical writings.