Fatal head injury in children younger than 2 years in New York City and an overview of the shaken baby syndrome.

Context: Shaken baby syndrome is a controversial topic in forensic pathology. Some forensic pathologists state that shaking alone is insufficient to explain death and that an impact must have occurred even if there is no impact site on the head.

Objective: To examine a large cohort of fatal, pediatric head injuries for patterns of specific autopsy findings and circumstances that would support or dispute pure shaking as the cause of death.

Use of "therapeutic complication" as a manner of death.

Analyses of deaths due to therapeutic complications (TCs) provide important quality of care information for medical providers. In New York City, 463 deaths were investigated by the Office of Chief Medical Examiner and certified with TC as the manner of death in 2003. The TC manner of death is used for fatalities due to predictable complications of appropriate medical therapy.

Schizophrenia as a cause of death.

Schizophrenia is a chronic disorder that is associated with increased mortality. Although traumatic deaths account for most of this increase, there is also an increased rate of natural deaths in this population. Altered autonomic physiology in this group might contribute to death.