Autopsy Unveiled the Mystery of Death of an Elderly Female Due to Minor Degree Burn Injury

The modern era of urbanization has seen a growing number of burn injuries inflicted in diverse manners. According to the National crime Research Bureau (NCRB) report of 2002 over 30,000 people died in India due to burn injuries, thereby contributing 9% of the total deaths. In all these conspicuous cases of deaths due to burn injuries, we, the autopsy surgeons, perform the complete autopsy to arrive at the conclusion regarding cause of death and also to help the investigating agencies to deduce the opinion regarding manner of the particular death. But the matter gets complicated medicolegally and more interesting academically if another overt pathological finding is detected incidentally during the course of dissection. In this following case one old lady was presented to us with minor degree ante mortem burn injuries. But after meticulous post mortem examination, huge hemopericardium with evidence of ante-mortem myocardial rupture was revealed, which single handedly can cause death.