Aims And Objectives Of Autopsy

Background: Autopsy is a investigative procedure that has been in use since several years. Even though It helps in arriving at a decision regarding the cause of death, its use is declining recently, which should be a cause of concern.
Aims and Objectives: To determine the perception and attitude of undergraduate medical students towards autopsy.
Materials and Methods: 300 undergraduate medical students, 200 females and 100 males were given a questionnaire and asked to fill the form anonymously. The data obtained was statistically analysed.
Results: Most of the students (235, 78.33%) were of opinion that autopsy procedure is necessary. Many of them stated that they gained knowledge from the autopsies they watched (246, 82%) and there is a need

Autopsy is a scientific study of a dead body and is categorized into clinical and medico-legal autopsies. It plays a crucial role in finding out the cause and the time of death, possible medico-legal issues surrounding death, providing data on disease and injury and also in administration of justice. Doctors with poor knowledge in autopsy may result in injustice[1, 2]. Recently the autopsy percentage is declining sharply all over the world and in China, autopsy has been scrapped out from the curriculum. According to Medical Council of India, our teaching curriculum should allow the compulsory witnessing of medico-legal autopsies by 2nd and 3rd year medical students, so that they can view and understand the diverse changes in tissues and organs[3, 4]. Apart from the hospital facilities and duty schedules, the limited curriculum by various medical councils is responsible for this decline in autopsies in medical institutions. Keeping in mind that autopsy helps students to understand various pathological conditions in several patients thereby making them a better clinicians in future, we carried out this study. Previously very few studies have been carried out regarding perception and attitudes of undergraduate medical students in south

This is similar to the findings of Ehsan et al who found 36.5% students to be comfortable, whereas only 21% were comfortable in the study by Nihal Ahmed[9, 10]. 40% of the students think that the number of autopsies they watched were enough. Whereas Rautji, Ekanem and Nihal Ahmad found that 72.3%, 57% and 62.3% of the participants agreed for the same respectively[3, 7, 10]. 60% of the students recommend that medical students should watch more autopsies. This is in contrast to other studies by Rautji, Ekanem and Nihal Ahmad who found 47.7%, 74% and 87.67% of their participants agreeing that more autopsies should be witnessed by medical students respectively[3, 7, 10]. For the question if given a chance would they chose not to watch autopsy at all, 22% answered as yes. Whereas only 16% and 17% chose not to watch autopsy in studies by Ekanem and Nihal Ahmad respectively[7, 10]. 57% students were of the opinion that post mortem examination causes disfigurement of body. This is in contrast to other studies who gave variable response of 65% and 27% by Ekanem and Nihal Ahmad respectively[7,