What is it about?
In England and Wales, doctors are charged with a responsibility either to report a death to the coroner or to issue a medical certificate specifying the cause of death. The development of different but consistent local regimes for reporting deaths to the coroner has meant that deaths reported in some areas will not be so reported in others. Over a ten year period 2001-2010 a reporting range of 12% of all deaths in one area to 87% in another was found.
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Why is it important?
Similar deaths in similar circumstances are not treated in comparable ways across England and Wales. Coroners are inconsistent in defining when a death should be considered natural or unnatural. Post-Shipman, the potential for foul play to remain undetected is unchanged.
Perspectives
This paper primarily identifies local variation in reporting deaths to the coroner. However, such variation is also apparent when rates of advancing deaths to inquest are examined, and in the varied use of verdict types by different coroners. The author is further studying differences by the sex of the deceased - deaths of women are universally less likely to be reported to the coroner and less likely to advance to inquest.
Mr Maxwell Mclean
University of Huddersfield
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Local variations in reporting deaths to the coroner in England and Wales: a postcode lottery?, Journal of Clinical Pathology, July 2013, BMJ,
DOI: 10.1136/jclinpath-2013-201640.
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