title: Technical note: unsafe rectal temperature measurements due to delayed warming of the thermocouple by using a condom. An issue concerning the estimation of the postmortem interval by using Henßge's nomogram.
abstract: In some cases, in the Netherlands, an additional layer is being added to the thermocouple, used to measure the rectal temperature in medicolegal death investigations. Because of this deviation from the standard method, questions arose regarding the accuracy and precision of the measured temperature. Therefore, a cooling experiment was carried out on a round body made of agar with an average thermal conductivity of 0.454 W/(m °C) while measuring the temperature with and without an additional layer around the thermocouple for three different starting temperatures: 36, 30, and 27 °C. The results show a significant difference between the measured values for the first 5 min when comparing with and without the additional layer. Further, a decrease in precision is present within the first minutes when using an additional layer. Therefore, it is concluded that it is best to measure the rectal temperature without an additional layer around the thermocouple and caution should be taken when measuring with an additional layer.
authors.affiliation: Ars Cogniscendi Centre for Legal and Forensic Medicine, Wezep, Netherlands. t.krap@amc.nl.|Department of Anatomy, Embryology and Physiology, Academic Medical Centre, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. t.krap@amc.nl.|Van Hall Larenstein, Forensic Science, University of Applied Sciences, Postbus 1528, 8901 BV, Leeuwarden, Netherlands. t.krap@amc.nl.
authors.forename: Tristan
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2438-3694
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Krap
authors.affiliation: Ars Cogniscendi Centre for Legal and Forensic Medicine, Wezep, Netherlands.
authors.forename: Joris
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Meurs
authors.affiliation: Department of Anatomy, Embryology and Physiology, Academic Medical Centre, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Janine
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Boertjes
authors.affiliation: Ars Cogniscendi Centre for Legal and Forensic Medicine, Wezep, Netherlands.|Public Health Service, Department of Forensic Medicine, IJsselland, Netherlands.
authors.forename: Wilma
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Duijst
mesh_terms: D001831:Body Temperature; D017280:Condoms; D005554:Forensic Medicine / Q000379:methods; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D049451:Nomograms; D011180:Postmortem Changes; D012007:Rectum / Q000502:physiology; D013821:Thermometers
keywords: Cooling; Interval; Model; Nomogram; Postmortem; Temperature