INTRODUCTION TO THE AGE-RELATED DIAGNOSIS (ARD) INDEX - AN AGE AT PRESENTATION RELATED INDEX FOR DIAGNOSTIC USE

Development and, therefore, age is important in paediatrics. Diagnosti cally useful data from this journal has been related to age and organi zed to form an age-related diagnostic (ARD) index. The ARD index is de signed for non-expert clinical and laboratory workers to use in the ea rly phases of diagnosis and as an addition to existing diagnostic sche mes. Entry to the index is from the age at clinical presentation. Each entry is a sequence starting with clinical and laboratory presentatio ns, clinical course, laboratory key investigations and finally diagnos is with volume and page numbers of the original article, the primary s ource. Within age groups, entries are grouped by diagnoses with the co mmonest diagnosis first; this has the effect of roughly but not precis ely grouping similar clinical and laboratory findings.