Mortuary Maintenance records

Shyam Kumar
Mortuary records, or death records, contain information on the cause
and the circumstance of each registered death.
• In most cases, detail is provided on the manner of death (natural,
accidental, suicidal, homicidal), the immediate cause of death (for example,
heart failure), the intermediate cause of death (for example, coronary heart
disease which has caused the heart failure), and any underlying causes of
death (other existing medical conditions not directly related to the death).

• For drowning-related deaths, information describing the drowning event

(time, place and location) may also be included. Data from mortuary
records can be used to investigate secondary variables.
• In many settings, cause of death is recorded using a standardised
classification system:

• World Health Organisation’s International Statistical Classification of

Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD). This system provides
standardised definitions and codes for numerous causes of death,
• The Department of Forensic Medicine provides the Mortuary services and
preserves dead bodies under the following situations:

• The MLC deaths.

• The MLC deaths of patients of other state/districts dying in a hospital during

treatment.

• Non-MLC deaths of patients dying in a hospital during treatment.

• Due to limited capacity in the cold chambers, Non-MLC deaths other than
those dying in the hospital will be preserved only after considering the
available space in cold chambers, rationale and need of the relatives.
CUSTODY OF MLC BODIES
• As per the law of land, the custodian of dead bodies in all cases of deaths where
further legal investigations are required is the jurisdictional police.

• The hospital acts as a facilitator for preserving the dead bodies till police
investigations are going on.

• The custody and responsibility of body directly lies with the Police without any
third party intervention.

• The request for preservation is entertained by authorized doctors of hospital

who write as “allowed to be preserved in morgue under the custody of police”.
• In absence of custodian police the possibility of exchange of dead
bodies in this situation also exists.

• The department provides logistics like space, undertaker's cabinets

and class IV assistants for local shifting of the dead bodies.

• To summarize, it is the responsibility of the police personnel for taking

24 hours care of all such dead bodies of MLCs and maintaining safe
legal custody of the MLC dead body.
PRESERVATION OF MLC DEAD BODIES DYING OUTSIDE

• The police personnel preserving the body must ensure that tag/ Label indicating the name
of police post with FIR number has been put on the dead body by the police for purposes of
identification.

• No dead body will be received and stored in the cold storage without any identity
tags/labels.

• The permission for preservation of the body has to be taken from the officer Incharge on
duty by filling a request form.

• In case of unknown bodies, the postmortem examination should be conducted as soon as

possible after 72 hrs. of death to avoid decomposition changes which may hinder the
determination of cause & manner of death.
PROCEDURE FOR RELEASE OF DEAD BODIES OF PATIENTS (MLC
AND NON MLC)
• In a MLC case, death occurring in any of the clinical areas viz. inpatient wards/ICU/Emergency, the dead body

will be mandatorily sent to the mortuary.

• In case of the death of an non-MLC patient, if the relatives of the patient want to receive the dead body

without delay, then the sister I/C/ senior most sister on duty will hand over the body to the relatives (against

receipt in the death register) along with the dead body receipt slip of the patient, against clearance received

from the central admission office. The ward sister will keep one copy of dead body receipt slip from one of the

death report forms before sending the 2 copies of the death report form to the central admission and enquiry

office (which is otherwise taken by the mortuary staff along with the dead body shifted to the mortuary).

• The procedure followed in such cases will essentially remain the same i.e. after the death of a patient, his/her

attendant will go to central admission and enquiry office (after clearing bills etc.) from where he will get a

dead body receipt slip with stamp “Body may be handed over”. Conti….
Conti…..

• The patient’s attendants will now approach the ward sister (instead of the mortuary) and she will
take their signatures accepting the receipt of the dead body in her death register (In place of
signatures of mortuary attendant who would have signed if the body was to be taken to mortuary).

• The ward sister will keep the dead body receipt slip (with stamp from central admission office) in
her records and will give dead body receipt slip kept with her from second copy of death report
form (which is otherwise taken by the mortuary attendant along with the dead body and is given by
him to the patient’s attendant along with the body) while retaining the dead body receipt slip (with
stamp from central admission office) in the records.

• However, in all such cases, the relatives have to be gently advised to complete the formalities and
remove the patient’s body within one hour of the declaration of the death; otherwise the body
may be sent to the mortuary.
INTAKE PROCEDURE AND MAINTENANCE OF MORTUARY
REGISTER
• The morgue attendants will receive the ‘Death Slip’ from the hospital
along with the dead body.

• Identity of the body should be confirmed by matching the label on body

by the Death slip particulars and should be matched with ID band.

• The morgue attendant will note the complete details of the death slip in
the register and ensure that the details in the dead body tag are matched
with the death slip.