BURN INJURY: GENERAL CONCEPTS AND INVESTIGATION BASED ON ANTEMORTEM AND POSTMORTEM OF CLINICAL INJURY

Abstract

Burn injury is a condition which catastrophic consequences can affect the sufferer
physically, socially, as well as financially. Medicolegal aspect of a burn requires
physicians to be able to examine burn injuries on both the living and the dead.
Burn injury is defined as tissue damage due to contact with dry heat (fire), humid
heat (vapor or hot liquid), chemicals (corrosive agents), electrical devices (lamp or
electrical current), friction, as well as electromagnetic energy. Burn can be
classified according to its breadth and degree. Death by burn injuries can be
classified into 2 categories which are slow death and the fast one. The difference
between antemortem and postmortem burn injury is that antemortem injury will
show several intravital signs in the bullae and vesicles while postmortem injury
will have none.Three main points exist in identifying antemortem and postmortem
burn injuries, namely redness lines, vesication, and reparative processes.