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Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series
Towards the end of 2019, a novel coronavirus was identified as the culprit for a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan, China. Since then, it has rapidly spread worldwide, affecting more than 43 million people, and in March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared it a pandemic. The purpose...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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MDPI
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7764537/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33321983 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics10121070 |
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author | Keresztesi, Arthur-Atilla Perde, Filip Ghita-Nanu, Andreea Radu, Carmen-Corina Negrea, Mihai Keresztesi, Gabriela |
author_facet | Keresztesi, Arthur-Atilla Perde, Filip Ghita-Nanu, Andreea Radu, Carmen-Corina Negrea, Mihai Keresztesi, Gabriela |
author_sort | Keresztesi, Arthur-Atilla |
collection | PubMed |
description | Towards the end of 2019, a novel coronavirus was identified as the culprit for a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan, China. Since then, it has rapidly spread worldwide, affecting more than 43 million people, and in March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared it a pandemic. The purpose of the study is to present the findings of 15 forensic autopsies performed in Romania, on SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) positive subjects, and to present the case of one SARS-CoV-2 infected patient who experienced a violent death, as established during their autopsy. A total of 11 male and 4 female patients were autopsied, and SARS-CoV-2 infection was diagnosed post-mortem in two cases. The most frequent symptoms before death were dry cough, dyspnoea, and fever. Hypertension, ischemic cardiac disease, and a history of stroke were the most frequent associated diseases. The mean duration from the symptoms’ debut to a RT-PCR positive SARS-CoV-2 test was 3.7 days, while the mean survival time from the RT-PCR positive test was 4.2 days. A histological examination was performed in seven cases and revealed, in most of them, hyaline membranes, and mixed inflammatory cell infiltration of the interstitium, alveoli, and perivascular areas. In addition, all of the examined cases developed small vessel thrombosis. A case of violent death was also reported, regarding a 87-year-old male subject who suffered a femur fracture (domestic fall) and was diagnosed with SARS-CoV-2 infection the following day after surgery. After transfer to a COVID-19 (coronavirus disease-19) support hospital, during an episode of behavioral disorder, the patient jumped from the first floor window. Death occurred a few days later, and the cause was established as bronchopneumonia superimposed on SARS-CoV-2 infection. In conclusion, autopsies should be conducted while providing a safe environment for professionals to perform them, because they are crucial procedures that can help gain a better understanding of the role of SARS-CoV-2 infection in thanatogenesis. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7764537 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | MDPI |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-77645372020-12-27 Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series Keresztesi, Arthur-Atilla Perde, Filip Ghita-Nanu, Andreea Radu, Carmen-Corina Negrea, Mihai Keresztesi, Gabriela Diagnostics (Basel) Article Towards the end of 2019, a novel coronavirus was identified as the culprit for a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan, China. Since then, it has rapidly spread worldwide, affecting more than 43 million people, and in March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared it a pandemic. The purpose of the study is to present the findings of 15 forensic autopsies performed in Romania, on SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) positive subjects, and to present the case of one SARS-CoV-2 infected patient who experienced a violent death, as established during their autopsy. A total of 11 male and 4 female patients were autopsied, and SARS-CoV-2 infection was diagnosed post-mortem in two cases. The most frequent symptoms before death were dry cough, dyspnoea, and fever. Hypertension, ischemic cardiac disease, and a history of stroke were the most frequent associated diseases. The mean duration from the symptoms’ debut to a RT-PCR positive SARS-CoV-2 test was 3.7 days, while the mean survival time from the RT-PCR positive test was 4.2 days. A histological examination was performed in seven cases and revealed, in most of them, hyaline membranes, and mixed inflammatory cell infiltration of the interstitium, alveoli, and perivascular areas. In addition, all of the examined cases developed small vessel thrombosis. A case of violent death was also reported, regarding a 87-year-old male subject who suffered a femur fracture (domestic fall) and was diagnosed with SARS-CoV-2 infection the following day after surgery. After transfer to a COVID-19 (coronavirus disease-19) support hospital, during an episode of behavioral disorder, the patient jumped from the first floor window. Death occurred a few days later, and the cause was established as bronchopneumonia superimposed on SARS-CoV-2 infection. In conclusion, autopsies should be conducted while providing a safe environment for professionals to perform them, because they are crucial procedures that can help gain a better understanding of the role of SARS-CoV-2 infection in thanatogenesis. MDPI 2020-12-10 /pmc/articles/PMC7764537/ /pubmed/33321983 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics10121070 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Article Keresztesi, Arthur-Atilla Perde, Filip Ghita-Nanu, Andreea Radu, Carmen-Corina Negrea, Mihai Keresztesi, Gabriela Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series |
title | Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series |
title_full | Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series |
title_fullStr | Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series |
title_full_unstemmed | Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series |
title_short | Post-Mortem Diagnosis and Autopsy Findings in SARS-CoV-2 Infection: Forensic Case Series |
title_sort | post-mortem diagnosis and autopsy findings in sars-cov-2 infection: forensic case series |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7764537/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33321983 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics10121070 |
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