@article{ref1,
title="Elevated body core temperature in medico-legal investigation of violent death",
journal="American journal of forensic medicine and pathology",
year="2009",
author="Demierre, Nadine and Wyler, Daniel and Zollinger, Ulrich and Bolliger, Stephan Andreas and Plattner, Thomas",
volume="30",
number="2",
pages="155-158",
abstract="Pathologically elevated body core temperature, measured at the death scene, is an important finding in medico-legal investigation of violent deaths. An abnormally high rectal temperature at any death scene may point to an underlying pathology, the influence of certain drugs or a hidden cerebral traumatism, and death by suffocation which would remain undetected without further medico-legal investigations. Furthermore, hyperthermia and fever, if unrecognized, may result in an erroneous forensic estimation of time since death in the early postmortem period by the &quot;Henssge method.&quot; By a retrospective study of 744 cases, the authors demonstrate that hyperthermia is a finding with an incidence of 10% of all cases of violent death. The main causes are: influence of drugs, malignant tumors, cerebral hypoxia as a result of suffocation, infections, and systemic inflammatory disorders. As a consequence it must be stated, that hyperthermia must be excluded in every medico-legal death scene investigation by a correct measurement of body core temperature and a comparison between the cooling rate of the body and the behavior of early postmortem changes, notably livor and rigor mortis.<p /><p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0195-7910",
doi="10.1097/PAF.0b013e31819a04a6",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/PAF.0b013e31819a04a6"
}