Retrospective Survey on Kawasaki Disease between 1940 and 1965 at Tokyo University Hospital

Abstract

Kawasaki disease (KD) was first reported by Dr. Tomisaku Kawasaki in 1967 in Japan. Large-scale nationwide epidemiological surveys have been continuously conducted by the Japan Kawasaki Disease Research Committee, however, there were few reports of KD before 1967. Because the causative agent of KD has not been elucidated yet, it is important to clarify when KD first broke out in Japan and what kind of environmental changes took place at that time around young children. To study when KD outbroke in Japan, we investigated medical charts of patients who had been hospitalized at Tokyo University Hospital, which is the oldest university hospital in Japan, from 1940 to 1965. We identified 10 patients whose symptoms fulfill the clinical criteria for KD. The ages of the patients ranged from 8 months to 5 years, and their final diagnosis were either Stevens-Johnson syndrome, allergic toxic erythema, Izumi fever, scarlet fever or cervical lymphadenitis. These 10 patients were found from 1950 to 1964, and none was found from 1940 to 1949, suggesting that some factors triggering the outbreak of KD emerged before 1950.