1 Department of Community and Occupational Health, Meharry Medical College School of Medicine, 1005 18th Ave, N, Nashville, TN 37208
To the Editor.
I have read with interest the article by Fixier and Laird on the value of mass blood pressure screening in children (Pediatrics 1983;72:459-463). I must strongly disagree with the conclusion reached by the authors in this study.
Among the criteria for any screening procedure is the requirement that the disease, for which the screening procedure is designed, be either prevalent enough or severe enough, or both, to justify screening for it in the first place.