Postmortem computed tomography and autopsy for detection of lesions and causes of death in gunshot injury cases: a comparative study

Egyptian Journal of Forensic Sciences

Table 2 Degree of agreement between PMCT and autopsy in detection of injuries in cases of multiple firearm injuries in the chest and abdomen by Cohen’s Kappa test

Lesion types number of cadavers =18	N	Detected by autopsy alone	Detected by PMCT alone	Kappa	Level of agreement	P
Lesion types number of cadavers =18	N	n	n	Kappa	Level of agreement	P
External wounds	18	18	10	0.53	Moderate	< 0.05*
Multiple inlet wounds	18	18	13	0.72	Substantial	< 0.001**
Direction of injury	12	12	6	0.51	Moderate	< 0.05*
Wound track	12	12	6	0.51	Moderate	< 0.05*
Retained bullets and fragments	10	10	10	1	Perfect	< 0.001**
Thoracic lesions
Rib fractures	14	10	14	0.71	Substantial	< 0.001**
Heart lesions	4	4	2	0.43	Moderate	< 0.05*
Hemopericarduim	4	4	2	0.43	Moderate	< 0.05*
Lung lacerations	16	16	14	0.87	Almost perfect	< 0.001**
Fracture of thoracic vertebrae	6	2	6	0.42	Moderate	> 0.05
Pneumothorax	16	0	16	0	–	1 NS
Hemothorax	16	16	16	1	Perfect	< 0.01**
Surgical emphysema	18	0	18	0	–	1 NS
Abdominal lesions
Liver	10	10	10	1	Perfect	< 0.001**
Blood vessels	10	8	10	0.87	Almost perfect	< 0.001**
Hemoperitoneum	10	8	10	0.87	Almost perfect	< 0.001**

N; total number of lesions detected; n: number of cases detected either by autopsy or PMCT; **: highly significant; *: significant, NS: non-significant