Assessment of death cases due to sharp force injuries

Sharp tools are widely used in daily life for various purposes at home, work places, public places, etc. These tools are generally used for attack, defense and even killing purposes due to always be at hand and not controlled by a specific legislation. In many countries around the world, injuries and deaths related to sharp force injuries which are the leading causes of murders have an important place in forensic medicine practice. The aim of this study was to evaluate the cases who has forensic autopsy due to sharp force injuries. The reports of the cases that underwent postmortem examination and forensic autopsies at Forensic Medicine Department of Fırat University between 2005- 2018 years were evaluated. There were 84 cases who died due to sharp force injuries. Of the cases, 67 (79,8%) were male and 17 (20,2%) were female. The youngest of the cases was 12 years, the oldest was 85 years and the mean age was 39,7 ± 17,86 years. The most common cases were in the 31-50 age group (n = 37, 44,0%). The most common origin was the murder with 77 (91,7%) cases. There was defensive wound in the 39 of the murder cases. Twenty-one of the all cases had a single wound. The most common site of injury was chest region. Cardiac injuries were seen in 40 (64,5%) of cases with chest injury. Sharp force injuries are an important social problem that affects people especially in the age when the population is productive. Preventive measures should be taken by analyzing the factors that facilitate violence. We believe that it would be useful to conduct careful postmortem examination together with a detailed investigation to determine the origin of the event. Key words: Sharp force injuries, forensic medicine, autopsy, murder