In celebration of NEJM’s 200th anniversary, a special series of articles is being published.  A recent one, titled “What we don’t see” makes some useful observations about the history and trajectory of the field of pediatrics (NEJM 2012; 366: 1328-34).

According to the author, most physicians did not consider children as a distinct medical population in the early part of the 19th century.

• In 1789 Benjamin Rush at the Univ of Pennsylvania gave lectures called “diseases peculiar to children.”
• William Osler introduced the term “pediatrics” in 1880.
• While advances in genetics, surgery, neonatology, oncology, and many other disciplines have been very important, infectious diseases have remained the predominant cause of childhood death both in the past and currently.
• In 2008, causes of childhood death worldwide:  pneumonia 19%, diarrhea 15%, malaria 8%, other infections 26%.  Diarrhea and pneumonia each killed more than 1 million children.
• Neonatal deaths comprised 41% of all deaths in the first 5 years of life.