Citation

Radojević N, Radnić B, Vucinic J, Cukić D, Lazovic R, Asanin B, Savic S. J. Forensic Leg. Med. 2016; 45: 21-28.

Affiliation

Institute of Forensic Medicine "Milovan Milovanovic", School of Medicine, University of Belgrade, Deligradska 31a, 11000, Belgrade, Serbia. Electronic address: slobodan.savic@mfub.bg.ac.rs.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2016, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.jflm.2016.11.006

PMID

27914998

Abstract

Current autopsy principles for evaluating the existence of brain edema are based on a macroscopic subjective assessment performed by pathologists. The gold standard is a time-consuming histological verification of the presence of the edema. By measuring the diameters of the cranial cavity, as individually determined morphometric parameters, a mathematical model for rapid evaluation of brain edema was created, based on the brain weight measured during the autopsy. A cohort study was performed on 110 subjects, divided into two groups according to the histological presence or absence of (the - deleted from the text) brain edema. In all subjects, the following measures were determined: the volume and the diameters of the cranial cavity (longitudinal and transverse distance and height), the brain volume, and the brain weight. The complex mathematical algorithm revealed a formula for the coefficient ε, which is useful to conclude whether a brain edema is present or not. The average density of non-edematous brain is 0.967 g/ml, while the average density of edematous brain is 1.148 g/ml. The resulting formula for the coefficient ε is (5.79 x longitudinal distance x transverse distance)/brain weight. Coefficient ε can be calculated using measurements of the diameters of the cranial cavity and the brain weight, performed during the autopsy. If the resulting ε is less than 0.9484, it could be stated that there is cerebral edema with a reliability of 98.5%. The method discussed in this paper aims to eliminate the burden of relying on subjective assessments when determining the presence of a brain edema.

Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd and Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine. All rights reserved.

Language: en