Medicolegal death investigations

The Association of State and Territorial Health Agencies (ASTHO) will provide an overview of the Project ECHO model and how the model has been adapted to create a supportive learning community of coroners and medical examiners dedicated to improving the investigation and certification of overdose deaths. 

This webinar was presented by the NIJ Forensic Technology Center of Excellence on October 7, 2021. 

This webinar will provide an overview of overdose fatality reviews (OFRs) with a specific focus on engaging partnerships with coroners, medical examiners, and medicolegal death investigators.  The presenters will highlight OFRs that have been implemented by engaging the medicolegal death investigation system and will discuss challenges and recommendations associated with implementing an OFR. The webinar will consist of three presentations on OFRs highlighting a county-level, a rural community, and a state-wide approach.

In the sixth and final webinar, participants will be introduced to the use of PMCT in the investigation of a variety of unnatural deaths not discussed in previous webinars.  Topics include overdose deaths, select asphyxial mechanisms of death, and sharp force injury.

This webinar was presented by the NIJ Forensic Technology Center of Excellence on May 18, 2021. 

In the fifth webinar, participants will be introduced to the use of PMCT in the investigation of natural deaths.  At the New Mexico OMI, a PMCT scan may be used to rule out trauma in apparently natural deaths, or to confirm a natural cause of death.  Depending on investigative details (circumstances, age, and medical history), and the PMCT findings, pathologists may choose to perform an external exam or a full autopsy.

This webinar was presented by the NIJ Forensic Technology Center of Excellence on May 11, 2021.

In the third webinar, participants will be introduced to the use of PMCT for examining decedents with gunshot wounds, both homicidal and self-inflicted.  At the New Mexico OMI, a PMCT scan is performed in virtually all gunshot wound (GSW) related deaths.  In cases of suspected homicide or suspicious suicides, autopsy is also performed.  However, in non-suspicious cases involving self-inflicted GSW, PMCT is combined with an external examination, and sometimes a partial autopsy to retrieve a retained projectile, replacing the full autopsy. 

This webinar will introduce participants to the use of PMCT in the diagnosis of blunt force trauma.  PMCT scan may be used to diagnose fatal trauma in certain situations, allowing an external examination with postmortem CT to supplant an autopsy, which may better honor religious and cultural requests of grieving family members.  Non-suspicious, traumatic deaths, such as motor vehicle collisions, are such an example.  Additionally, PMCT often provides additional documentation of internal injuries where fatal injuries are obvious on external examination. 

In the first webinar, participants will be introduced to x-ray computed tomography (CT) and some key differences between CT and traditional x-ray.  The basic specifications of a CT scanner (such as bore diameter, maximum image size, and table specifications) will be introduced, with reference to their impact on whole body post-mortem scanning in particular.  Basic considerations for deploying a CT scanner in a medical examiner setting (cost, personnel, space, safety) will also be discussed.  

In the second webinar of the Post-mortem Computed Tomography Series, participants will be introduced to the use of PMCT as a triage tool in a busy forensic pathology practice.  Participants will first learn about the history of the use of PMCT at the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator (OMI) and the existing research and literature on the efficacy of PMCT in the medical examiner setting. 

This webinar was presented by the NIJ Forensic Technology Center of Excellence on April 20, 2021.