ABSTRACT

Death from cancer is mostly considered as natural deaths. The role of cancer as a cause of death in forensic autopsies such as sudden deaths, negligence or malpractice claims is being investigated. In a small amount of forensic cases, cancer is found incidentally at the autopsy. The aim of this study was to reveal characteristics of the cases in which cancer was diagnosed and malignancies' types in medico legal autopsies. The role of forensic autopsies in determining oncological diseases was discussed.

Forensic autopsies were performed in the Morgue Department of Forensic Medicine Council in Izmir for eight years were retrospectively reviewed. Postmortem histopathological examination performed and malignant tumors diagnosed were included. Data about age, sex, location of tumors, immediate causes of death and the potential relation between tumors and the primary cause of death were investigated.

In eight-year period (between 2001 and 2009), 3722 medicolegal autopsies were performed by postmortem histopathological examination. 79 cases with malignant tumors included in the study, 79.7% were male and 20.3% were female, mean age was 54.96±20.35 (range: 7-88) years. The tumors were most frequently located in respiratory system (35.4%), gastrointestinal system (19%), genitourinary system (10.1%) and central nervous s y s t e m ( 8 . 9 % ) r e s p e c t i v e l y. A c c o r d i n g t o histopathological classification, the most frequent tumors were epithelial tumors (65.8%), followed by hemopoetic (12.7%), mesenchymal (7.6%). Cause of death was considered as cancer related complications in 73.4%, other natural causes in 7.6% and external factors such as traumas and intoxications in 12.7%.

Providing accurate cancer statistics by only clinical trials or medical autopsies that are diminished nowadays and clinical cancer outputs seems to be inadequate. We participated that investigating malignancies in large series of forensic autopsies would be contributed to data about public health.