This is a sub-specialty of Forensic Medicine which has been initiated at AIIMS Bhopal under the guidance of Prof Arneet Arora, Professor and Head of the Forensic Medicine and Toxicology department at AIIMS Bhopal.
This sub-specialty does not exist anywhere else in India as part of a medico legal autopsy related investigation. Adding information about the microbiological status in a deceased has advantages in investigation of the case and in providing more accurate and detailed information to the family of the deceased regarding cause of death of the deceased.
Post Mortem Microbiology means exploring the presence of microbes and presence of infection in the body of the deceased. This reflects the microbial status and the status of infection of the person at the time of death. This branch exists in countries of Europe and parts of America and Australia and is useful in detecting deaths due to infection, septicaemia and presence of drug resistant organisms in the person and in the community.
Prof Arneet Arora has been given membership of the only organisation of Post Mortem Microbiology in the world, ESCMID-ESGFOR. This is a European organisation and the abbreviation stands for European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases - Study Group for Forensic Microbiology.
In the recent Post Graduate Training by ESCMID-ESGFOR in Post Mortem Microbiology, in March 2023, for the program 4 presentations from AIIMS Bhopal were accepted, were presented and appreciated by the Organisers. These presentations were given by Dr Arneet Arora, Dr Jayanthi Yadav, Dr Mrinal Patnaik and Dr Sibi Vijaya Kumar.
An intra-mural research project on Post Mortem Microbiology was approved and conducted by the department in 2022 after due process of approval from the Institutional Human Ethics Committee (IHEC) and taking consent from next of kin of research participants.
The department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology in collaboration with the department of Microbiology at AIIMS Bhopal provides the Post Mortem Microbiology (PMM) services in medico legal autopsy cases and has added a new dimension to the understanding of deaths related to infections.
