Forensic Autopsy in the Elderly

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
We analyzed deaths in a geriatic population investigation by the Mobile County (Alabama) Coroner''s Office during the three years of 1983 through 1985 inclusively. These subjects died both within and outside hospitals and thus provide broad representation of all types of deaths in the elderly. Of the total number of deaths investigated by the Coroner''s Office, 924 of the decreased (39%) were 65 years old or older; they represent 15% of the deaths occurring in Mobile County in this age group. Of these 924 deaths, 209 (23%) were studied by autopsy; this number is 36% of the total autopsies done on subjects aged 65 or more in Mobile County during this three-year period and 89% of autopsies done after death from trauma (ie, homicide, suicide, accident, or undetermined). The potential value of medicolegal investigative data with regard to mortality statistics and the elderly is emphasized.