Can post-mortem computed tomography be considered an alternative for autopsy in deaths due to hemopericardium?
Lorenzo Gitto
Serenella Serinelli
Francesco P Busard
Valeria Panebianco
Giorgio Bolino
Aniello Maiese
摘要：Hemopericardium is a common finding at autopsy, but it may represent a challenge for the forensic pathologist when the etiopathologi-cal relationship in causing death is requested. Hemopericardium and cardiac tamponade can be evaluated in living people using radiological techniques, in particular computer tomography (CT). Only a few studies are reported in literature involving post-mortem (PM) cases, where PMCT imaging has been used in order to investigate acute hemopericardium, and they have shown a good accuracy of this technique. Here we report a case involving a 70-year-old white male found dead on the beach, with a medical history of hepatitis C and chronic hypertension with a poor pharmacological response. A PMCT was performed about 3 h after the discovery of the body. The PMCT examination showed an intrapericardial aortic dissection associated to a periaortic hematoma, a sickle-shaped intramural hematoma, a false lumen, and a hemop-ericardium consisting in fluid and clotted blood. In this case, the PMCT was able to identify the cause of death, even though a traditional autopsy was required to confirm the radiological findings. PMCT is a reliable technique, which in chosen cases, can be performed without the need for a traditional autopsy to be carried out.
机标关键词：
论文发表日期：2014-10-01
在线出版日期：2025-08-15（本平台首次上网日期，不代表文献的发表时间）
页数：5( 363-367 )
英文信息