Parents recognise benefits of postmortems

Parents who have lost a baby view the postmortem examination as a useful and necessary tool in helping to discover the reasons why their baby died. The most common reasons given for agreeing to a postmortem examination were wanting more information about what had happened and helping to improve medical knowledge and research, say Rankin and colleagues (p 816). Parents who did not agree to a postmortem examination felt their baby had suffered enough, but some had regrets about their decision. One said: "Now, two years later, I would like to know why they died," and another: "An answer may have alleviated the burden of guilt." The authors say that all medical staff involved in obtaining consent for postmortem examinations should be fully trained in how to ask for parental consent, the postmortem examination procedure, and how to explain the findings.

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Relevant Article

Cross sectional survey of parents' experience and views of the postmortem examination

Judith Rankin, Chris Wright, and Tom Lind
BMJ 2002 324: 816-818. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]