You may feel inclined to start your vital records search at the beginning with the birth record, but many experts recommend looking for a death record first. This is because the death record is the most recent record, and therefore the most likely to be available.

When using the information found in death records, it is important to remember that the informant may have accidentally provided some inaccurate information. For example, children of immigrants frequently never knew their "old country" grandparents and had to guess at their names. The same is also true of birth dates and even places.