What is the frequency of pulmonary embolism found at autopsy in humans?
This study aims to determine the true frequency of pulmonary embolism in human autopsies, noting that routine post-mortem examinations often inadequately inspect pulmonary arteries.
RECOGNITION of the magnitude of the problem of pulmonary embolism in man requires reliable data concerning its incidence. Unfortunately, most of the available statistics on incidence are based on routine post-mortem examinations in which the pulmonary arteries are rarely inspected adequately.We were stimulated to examine the frequency of human pulmonary embolism found at autopsy as a result of observations in an experimental investigation of pulmonary embolism in dogs.1 , 2 While studying the fate of experimentally induced autologous peripheral venous thrombi released to the pulmonary circulation, we repeatedly noted that some of the residua observed weeks to months after the embolic . . .
Freiman et al. (Thu,) studied this question.