𝔖 Bobbio Scriptorium
✦   LIBER   ✦

Blood alcohol concentrations of sudden unexpected deaths and non natural deaths

✍ Scribed by Shin-Ichi Kubo; Gerhard Dankwarth; Klaus Püschel

Publisher
Elsevier Science
Year
1991
Tongue
English
Weight
416 KB
Volume
52
Category
Article
ISSN
0379-0738

No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.

✦ Synopsis

This study reports on the relationships between the blood alcohol concentration (BAC) and the cause of death - which is of course common knowledge for forensic scientists! Our special aim was to gain unselected data for generalizing conclusions. The blood of 2465 consecutive cases (86% of all 2852 sudden unexpected and unnatural fatalities investigated at the Institute for Legal Medicine in Hamburg during the year 1989) was analysed. The BAC was evaluated according to sex, age, cause of death and place of death. In natural causes of death there were 80% cases under 0.05% BAC. Endocrine and digestive system diseases in particular were associated with positive BAC values. In unnatural death cases the BAC under 0.05% was found in 64% of the suicides, 62% of the accidents, 54% of the homicides and 51% of the drug intoxications. The drowning cases showed higher BAC's than traffic accidents. In suicides middle aged males had high BAC's.

📜 SIMILAR VOLUMES

Risk factors, diagnosis and prevention o
Risk factors, diagnosis and prevention of sudden unexpected infant death
✍ Akihiro Takatsu; Akio Shigeta; Kentaro Sakai; Shuntaro Abe 📂 Article 📅 2007 🏛 Elsevier Science 🌐 English ⚖ 123 KB

The diagnosis of the cause of sudden unexpected infant death (SUID) is often difficult work for forensic pathologists. Its misdiagnosis or misclassification is the cause of crucial epidemiological and medicolegal problems. During the sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) epidemic, many reports describ