Autopsy rates and diagnostic errors in a Swiss community hospital: a ten-year retrospective analysis.

ABSTRACT: Historically, autopsy has served as a procedure to determine the cause of death. With the surge in diagnostic techniques and a change in mindset, autopsy rates have decreased globally to less than 10%. Besides providing the cause of death and insights into disease mechanism, autopsy may assess clinical performance via discrepancy analysis. The objectives of our study were to determine autopsy rates in a Swiss community hospital and major discrepancies between clinical and autopsy reports according to the Goldman classification. Of 1711 registered in hospital deaths between 2012 and 2021, 123 patients were subjected to autopsy, resulting in an average autopsy rate of 7.2%. Younger patients had higher autopsy rates (17.0% for patients aged 50-59 years), and sex-adjusted male-to-female autops

SUBMITTER: Hagen CM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12391221 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature