HellsBells Posted May 25, 2009 Posted May 25, 2009 No shit. Sounds like this guys not too keen on the "book learning"
Jeepluv77 Posted May 25, 2009 Posted May 25, 2009 Are you friggin kidding me!? Am I the only one that thinks it's absolutely ridiculous for a woman beaten to death and a man shot in the head to have been "mistakenly" deemed to have died from natural causes? Is the ME even looking at the victims or just signing of paperwork? I just don't see any other way for this to happen. And I like how they try to shift the blame to the medic. Here at least, if they are obviously dead the coroner comes to the scene and takes over. So we may not catch the bullet hole because at that point we don't even look them over as we could destroy evidence. Either way, regardless of what the medic said, it's the MEs job to determine cause of death, not the medic.
tskstorm Posted May 25, 2009 Posted May 25, 2009 It is quite ridiculous ... The people who are making these mistakes should be fired ..
spenac Posted May 25, 2009 Posted May 25, 2009 How do you miss bulletholes? Run faster than the bullets?
Doczilla Posted May 25, 2009 Posted May 25, 2009 There are times when a cause of death will be assigned by a physician who does not see the patient. Someone with an extensive medical history who arrests in the field or in the hospital will frequently not undergo autopsy, and the family physician will sign the death certificate. While this does not determine cause of death with CSI precision, it is adequate in most cases. If there is foul play suspected, or if the cause of death is due to trauma, then the coroner will take the case. Interestingly, I had a patient in her mid 50s from the nursing home come into the ER in full arrest. As per the NH, she had increasing respiratory distress and hypoxia, so EMS was called. Upon their arrival, she was profoundly bradycardic and arrested shortly thereafter. She was in the NH for PT and rehab from a bimal ankle fracture, and due to her obesity and already considerable difficulty ambulating, as well as COPD and respiratory failure that necessitated a prolonged hospital stay. She was non-weight-bearing on that leg, and given her presentation, we felt a PE was the most likely cause of death, with an alternative or secondary cause being COPD. She had been on appropriate anticoagulation. I spoke with the treating physician, who agreed to sign the death certificate. The coroner did not release the body and slated her for autopsy, which I thought was odd until he explained it to me. Since we suspected PE, and the PE would be related to her immobility, which was related to her fracture, then her proximate cause of death was traumatic in nature. 'zilla
firedoc5 Posted May 30, 2009 Posted May 30, 2009 So.....a medic, nurse, doc, or whoever can go to an ME and say "take my word for it, it was natural causes"? I think not. Now I can see how someone had been battling cancer or was in a vegitative state in a nursing home for a number of years they may do a very basic post or at least be opened up. But missed bullet holes and the 'assumed" cause of death is just so surprising. Maybe I got spoiled due to even though we had just a small populated county(approx. 25k), no matter the apparent cause of death there was, at least a preliminary post was done.
Recommended Posts