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Coroners and Justice Act 2009

137.The 1988 Act makes a distinction between post-mortem and “special” examinations (the latter are a more specific kind of post-mortem examination and would include toxicology tests to establish whether, for example, alcohol or drugs were in the bloodstream). The Act removes this distinction, enabling the senior coroner to detail the kind of examination he or she would like the practitioner to make – for example, to ask for a particular examination of a tissue or organ which seems most relevant to the cause of death if a full post-mortem is not considered necessary (subsection (2)).

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