Remember by heart – the importance of post-mortem cardiac implantable electronic device analysis

In recent years, the number of patients with a cardiac implantable electronic device (CIED) has been steadily increasing. Implantable cardioverter-defibrillators (ICDs) are currently one of the primary methods of preventing sudden cardiac death (SCD) in patients at risk. A post-mortem CIED examination, which these days is performed very rarely, as well as the analysis of the recordings may provide key information regarding the circumstances of the patient’s death. This applies to both the potential impact of a defect or damage to the device in an event of the owner’s death and the forensic analysis of the circumstances of death, especially when traditional post-mortem diagnostics do not provide a clear diagnosis. In addition, using the data stored on the device, it is possible to identify the corpse and precisely determine the time of death, which is crucial for the conducted expertise. Since it is a quick, cheap and widely available procedure, CIED analysis should be incorporated as a routine element of post-mortem diagnostics.