Evidence map›Paper›PMID 36038738›Full record

ArticleInternational journal of legal medicine2024

Seasonal variation in medico-legal autopsies in Finland-a nationwide analysis of the period 2016-2021.

Petteri Oura

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in International journal of legal medicine, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
5citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

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3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

5 citing papers in PubMed.

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4 · The record

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PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author.

Petteri OuraDepartment of Forensic Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 21 (Haartmaninkatu 3), Helsinki, FI-00014, Finland. petteri.oura@helsinki.fi.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Both natural and unnatural mortality have seasonal variation. In spite of the established link between season and mortality, it is unclear whether medico-legal autopsies are subject to similar variation. Building on a nationwide dataset from the years 2016-2021, this short report aimed to analyse whether medico-legal autopsies are subject to seasonal variation in Finland. An electronic information system was queried for the monthly numbers of performed autopsies. Monthly and yearly trends were estimated with Kruskal-Wallis test and linear regression. A total of 50,457 medico-legal autopsies were performed during the 6-year study period. There were on average 29 to 47 autopsies per day, with an estimated annual decline of 1.8% (95% confidence interval 0.7-2.9%) over the study period. Monthly and yearly variation in autopsies was mostly minor and irregular; statistically significant differences were only observed between January and September as well as January and November (p < 0.05). As such, there appears to be little seasonal variation in medico-legal autopsies in Finland. A mild declining trend in the number of autopsies was observed. Future studies are invited to explore patterns of seasonality in other medico-legal systems, for example in those with generally lower autopsy rates than in Finland.

Indexed as

SeasonsAutopsyCause of DeathFinlandHumansFinlandMedico-legal autopsySeasonalityTrendVariation

Identifiers

PMID36038738
PMCPMC10772001

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.