Medico-legal data are presented on 995 child deaths, 361 girls and 634 boys aged 0–18 years, whose brains were weighed at the time of autopsy using a standardized weighing technique (the brains were weighed before fixation, immediately after entire removal; the medulla oblongata was divided in the foramen magnum). From the results it appears that the brain weights are greater than those reported in a previously published series. This may be ascribed to a higher degree of oedema and a shorter duration of illness, or an absence of illness; another explanation may be related to a difference in origin. It should be remembered that post-mortem brain weights exceed the ante-mortem weights by up to 9%. The greater part of brain growth is completed by the end of the 2nd year of life, and thereafter the brain weight in girls is on the average a little lower than that in boys. No significant differences in brain weights are found in the various groups of causes of death; the brain weights in the group of sudden, unexpected infant deaths especially do not deviate from those in the other groups.
In 20 cases with known times of death continuous post-mortem measurements of the temperature fall in brain, calf, liver, axilla and rectum of the bodies have been made, and, in addition, the environmental temperature has been recorded. The observations were not made under standardized conditions, and the clothing of the bodies was left untouched as far as possible. The measurements of the brain temperatures have given the greatest accuracy in determining the time of death; for temperatures above 25 °C the uncertainty was of the order of magnitude of ±2 1/2 hours, at lower temperatures greater. The other sites of measurement permitted less reliable estimates of the post-mortem time, but none of them were found to be appropriate beyond 20 hours after death. There is one factor which cannot be calculated. It is the temperature at the moment of death. All investigations show that it may vary enormously. In the present study the difference between the maximum and the minimum starting temperature ranges between 5 °C and 8 °C, dependent on the site of measurement. As the fall in temperature—irrespective of the site of measurement—during the first few hours post mortem is of the magnitude of 1 °C per hour, the above variation gives an inaccuracy which by far exceeds what can be achieved of greater accuracy by the aid of brain temperature measurements. For this reason the authors feel justified in concluding that the determination of the time of death will always be encumbered with great uncertainty, but that the most reliable estimate within the first 20 hours after death can be based upon the measurement of the brain temperature associated with an evaluation of the development of the signs of death. None of the other methods tested so far appears to have offered a greater reliability.
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