Legal medicine
-
In our institutes, we perform a quantitative evaluation of volatile hydrocarbons in post-mortem blood in all fatal fire-related cases using headspace gas chromatography mass spectrometry. We previously reported that benzene concentrations in the blood were positively correlated with carbon monoxide-hemoglobin (CO-Hb) concentrations in fire-related deaths. ⋯ Comparing volatile hydrocarbons with CO-Hb concentrations can provide more information about the circumstances surrounding fire-related deaths. We are currently convinced that this is the best method to detect if carbon monoxide poisoning occurred before a house fire started.
-
Autopsy is the traditional gold standard for determining the cause and manner of death in a forensic death investigation. However, postmortem imaging plays an ever-growing role in preliminary examination, even replacing conventional autopsy in some cases. ⋯ The cause and manner of death were exclusively determined by postmortem radiology. Based on radiological findings, the autopsy was considered redundant and cancelled by the public prosecutor.
-
Pancreatic stone protein/regenerating protein has recently emerged as an interesting diagnostic and prognostic marker of inflammation and sepsis in the clinical field. Increased blood concentrations have been described in patients with sepsis. Moreover, a high accuracy in predicting fatal outcomes in septic patients admitted to intensive care units has been reported. ⋯ A significant positive correlation was found between procalcitonin and pancreatic stone protein/regenerating protein values in septic cases. Pancreatic stone protein/regenerating protein is measurable in postmortem serum from femoral blood collected during autopsy. Additionally, as in the clinical field, pancreatic stone protein/regenerating protein can be used as a postmortem biochemical marker for the diagnosis of sepsis.
-
Previous studies suggested that serum catecholamines are useful for investigating stress responses in the death process. The present study analyzed postmortem urinary adrenaline (Ad), noradrenaline (Nad) and dopamine (DA) in serial forensic autopsy cases (n=199: 154 males and 45 females; age >9years; survival time <0.5-168h; within 10days postmortem) to investigate the differences among the causes of death with special regard to hyperthermia (heatstroke; n=11) and hypothermia (cold exposure; n=10); other cases included fatalities from injury (n=47), mechanical asphyxiation (n=18), drowning (n=14), intoxication (n=31), fire fatality (n=33) and natural death (n=35). Each catecholamine level in urine was independent of the age or gender of the subjects, postmortem interval over 10days or survival time, and did not correlate with the blood level. ⋯ Adr and Nad were higher in blunt head injury, methamphetamine abuse, hypothermia (cold exposure) and hyperthermia (heat stroke), but were low in mechanical asphyxia, drowning, fire fatality, sedative-hypnotic intoxication and acute cardiac death. DA was higher in injury, drowning, fire fatality, methamphetamine abuse and acute cardiac death, but was lower in mechanical asphyxiation and sedative-hypnotic intoxication. These profiles were quite different from those of serum levels, involving a predominant increase of DA, and may be useful for differentiating hyperthermia (heatstroke) and hypothermia (cold exposure) from drowning, sedative-hypnotic intoxication and sudden cardiac death.
-
Case Reports
Post mortem computed tomography: useful or unnecessary in gunshot wounds deaths? Two case reports.
Post-mortem computer tomography (PMCT) is currently an useful procedure that can elucidate patterns of injuries, providing strong medical evidence that is very useful during litigation and at trial. This technique is especially useful in gunshot wounds cases, allowing an easier location and retrieval of the bullet and/or its fragments inside the body. In such cases, the use of 3D rendering can be very useful in order to obtain essential information, such as: accurate depict of the wound track, discerning between entrance and exit wounds, show bone's fracture and its fragments course inside the body. ⋯ The crime scene reconstruction was performed using the software Poser Debut® on a Mac OS X computer. In both cases, PMCT showed multiple advantages: objectivity, reproducibility, ease visualization of the wound paths, easy localization of bullet and their fragments, allowing us to clarify the cause of death before the traditional autopsy. PMCT should became a standard in forensic practice as an aid to the tradition postmortem examination to obtain as much information as possible in order to clarify the cause and manner of death.