Legal medicine
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Buckle rib fractures are incomplete fractures involving the inner cortex alone, and are rarely detected on routine chest X-ray or at autopsy. The characteristics of these fractures have not been well evaluated in situ although they are commonly observed on postmortem CT images especially following CPR. The postmortem CT findings in 42 cases showing buckle rib fractures caused by CPR were reviewed. ⋯ Over 97% of all CPR associated rib fractures are located in the anterior one third of the ribs based on a new measurement method utilizing oblique axial multiplanar reconstruction of the CT data. When recognition of incomplete or buckle rib fractures on postmortem CT is taken into account, detection of symmetry and continuity of rib fractures typically associated with CPR is improved compared with the detection of complete fractures alone. Recognition of buckle rib fractures and their characteristics on postmortem CT is of benefit to the forensic pathologist in evaluating the possibility of CPR and the differentiation of resuscitative artifact from forensically significant visceral injury observed at autopsy.
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Creatine kinase-MB (CK-MB), cardiac troponin I (cTnI) and myoglobin (Mb) are biochemical markers of myocardial injury; however, Mb is more abundant in skeletal muscles. The present study involved analysis of these markers in pericardial and cerebrospinal fluids (PCF and CSF) from serial medicolegal autopsy cases (n=295, within 48h) to examine their efficacy in determining the cause of death. Although these markers showed a slight postmortem time-dependent elevation, except for CK-MB in CSF, the distribution depended on the cause of death. ⋯ PCF cTnI level was higher in acute pulmonary embolism without significant elevation of any other markers, whereas CSF CK-MB was higher in acute blunt brain injury death and methamphetamine abuse. In most cases of delayed brain injury death, hypothermia (cold exposure) and pneumonia, these markers were low or intermediate in both PCF and CSF; however, sudden cardiac death, asphyxiation and fire fatality cases showed few characteristic findings. These observations suggest that combined analyses of these markers in postmortem PCF and CSF, in addition to blood samples, are helpful for evaluating the severity of myocardial and/or skeletal muscle damage in death processes, in particular for investigating deaths due to hyperthermia, hypothermia, electrocution and intoxication.