The Infant Injury Database: A Tool for the Study of Injury Patterns in Medicolegal Investigations of Child Abuse

Miriam E. Soto Martinez, Jennifer C. Love, Deborrah C. Pinto, Jason M. Wiersema, Sharon M. Derrick, Angela Bachim, Christopher Greeley, Marcella Donaruma-Kwoh, Van Thi Thanh Truong, Si Gao, Christian M. Crowder

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

In 2012, the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences began prospectively collecting injury data from pediatric autopsies. These data and associated case information from 635 pediatric cases are archived in the Infant Injury Database (IID). This paper introduces the IID to the forensic community and demonstrates its potential utility for child abuse and infant fatality investigations. The database is intended to be a source of evidence-based research for coroners/medical examiners and clinicians in the recognition and diagnosis of child abuse. RR estimates were employed to quantify the relationship between individual autopsy findings to trauma-related and nontrauma-related causes of death. For example, unsurprisingly, the RR of trauma cases with multiple injury types is significantly greater than other causes of death, but the RR results provide a quantitative representation of the relationship. ROC curve modeling of the presence/absence of various injury types performed well at discriminating trauma from other causes of death (AUC = 0.96).

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1622-1632
Number of pages11
JournalJournal of Forensic Sciences
Volume64
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Nov 1 2019

Keywords

  • child
  • data sharing
  • databases
  • forensic science
  • infant
  • injury

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Pathology and Forensic Medicine
  • Genetics

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