Archiwum medycyny sa̧dowej i kryminologii
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Arch Med Sadowej Kryminol · Apr 2007
[Differentiation possibilities in posttraumatic neuropsychiatric disorders in medico-legal certification].
This paper is a continuation of the previous work entitled "Difficulties in estimation of posttraumatic neuropsychiatric disorders for the purpose of criminal and civil law proceedings" presented during the 5th National Symposium "Days of Medical Certification", Poznan 2005. Referring to the then mentioned problem, the authors present in a greater detail the possibilities of objectivization of claims using simple psychiatric and psychological diagnostic tools
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Arch Med Sadowej Kryminol · Apr 2007
[Opinionating difficulties in cases concerning the use of psychoactive agents by traffic participants].
In recent years, there has been observed an increasing number of traffic participants being under the influence of drugs or other than alcohol agents that affect the central nervous system. In the period from 1997 until June 2006, 435 blood samples collected from traffic participants suspected of having ingested psychoactive agents were examined in the Forensic Medicine Department, Medical University of Silesia, Katowice. Eighty-five blood samples were positive.
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Arch Med Sadowej Kryminol · Apr 2007
[Limitations in medico-legal appraisal of sobriety or alcohol intoxication in drivers and the use of retrospective calculation. Practical comments based on an analysis of the files investigated in the chair of forensic medicine, Medical University of Silesia, Katowice, in the years 2000-2004].
In case of a driver who was involved in and survived a traffic accident, the analysis of expired air or blond sampling for alcohol determination is usually done within a shorter or longer time interval after the event. Thus, that the obtained analytical results are to be referred to the time when the examination or sampling was done, whereas the courts are interested in the driver's sobriety of alcohol intoxication at the critical moment, i.e. at the moment of the accident. Knowledge of alcohol toxicology allows for performing some simplified calculations to determine estimated blood alcohol concentration levels similar to those at the critical moment by using the so-called retrospective analysis. The authors performed a statistical analysis of the court files investigated at the Chair of Forensic Medicine, Medical University of Silesia, Katowice, in the years 2000-2004, especially focusing on difficulties encountered in cases of alcohol intoxication in perpetrators of traffic collisions.
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The author addresses several issues concerning the current condition of forensic medicine and further trends of its development. One can believe that the split and the crisis of forensic medicine may result from the enfeeblement of its institutional character caused by changes to legal proceedings requirements. Disintegration seems to be also caused by strong subspecialty tendencies resulting from the progress and the increasing specialization in individual biological sciences forming a joint paradigm of forensic medicine, i.e. medico-legal toxicology, hemogenetics, histopathology and classic forensic medicine.