Homeless deaths in Istanbul, Turkey

Abstract 

We retrospectively analyzed the autopsy records of the Council of Forensic Medicine during the 5-year period between the years 2000 and 2004 to contribute to the efforts targeted at lowering death rate in the milieu of homelessness by documenting the current status of this group particularly in terms of mode of death. Two hundred and nine of the 229 cases (91.27%) were males and remaining 20 were females. The preponderance of male cases in our autopsy population was also detected in homeless population. Most of the cases were in the age group of 40–49 years (64 cases, 27.95%). One hundred and ninety two corpses (83.85%) were found outdoors and only 37 of the cases (16.15%) indoors.

Natural events constituted the cause of death in 138 of the cases (60.26%) and in remainder 91 cases the cause of death was related to an unnatural event (39.74%). In approximately 1/3 of the cases of natural death cases, autopsy revealed the evidence of pulmonary tuberculosis but only in 32 of these cases the tuberculosis was the primary cause of death. The presence of alcohol was found to be significantly associated with the manner of death. Blood alcohol level over 50mg/100ml was determined only in 9.42% of natural death cases, whereas it was positive in 61.53% of unnatural death cases. We concluded that immediate precautions targeted at lowering death rate in this population must include health care for preventable natural diseases.

Keywords: Homeless, Natural death, Unnatural death, Forensic medicine, Autopsy