Mortality trends due to circulatory system diseases in Brazil: 1950 to 2000.

Background: The circulatory system diseases (CAD), one of the most important current health problems, have started to show a declining trend in mortality in several countries, although they are still proportionally the number one regarding the statistics of morbimortality.
Objective: To analyze the mortality trend due to CAD in Brazilian capital cities, during the period of 1950 to 2000.
Methods: Temporal series study, of Standardized Mortality Ratios by CAD. We used secondary data on death from the statistical annual reports from IBGE (the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics) and from the Mortality Information System. We carried out a linear trend analysis of the Standardized Mortality Ratios due to CAD in the Brazilian capital cities that presented complete mortality series, considering the census years during the study period (1950 to 2000).
Results: Although proportionally the CAD represent the main cause of death in the Brazilian population, as well as presenting a proportional increase during the period of analysis of this study, the risk of death, represented by the Standardized Mortality Ratios, have been decreasing, particularly from the eighties onward. It is noteworthy the fact that Fortaleza, Salvador, Belo Horizonte, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo presented elevated Standardized Mortality Ratios, however with a decreasing trend (p<0.05 and p<0.10), since the start of the analyzed period.
Conclusion: The behavior of the risk of death due to CAD suggests that this group of diseases is the first to be established, following the increase in industrialization observed from the thirties onward and after the Second World War in Brazil, as it occurred in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, cities that historically experienced a process of development and urbanization earlier and at a higher extent, when compared to the other capital cities.