[Use of rectal temperature-time of death nomograms at the scene of death].

The application of the rectal temperature time of death nomogram at the scene of death by 11 authors from 6 lego-medical institutes resulted in a standard deviation of the differences between nomographic and real death time of +/- 1.3 h in 46 cases (group I) with met requirements and clearly defined points of contact, nevertheless, including 9 cases with a more progressive cooling (0.5 greater than Q greater than or equal to 0.2). In cases with a real death time of more than 4h (N = 26) the standard deviation was +/- 1.0 hours corresponding to permissible variation of 95% of +/- 2.0 hours. Consequently, the permissible variation of 95% was much smaller than that suggested by the nomogram. The nomographic death time interval did not agree with the real one in 5 cases out of additional 30 cases with recognizably unsure points of contact (group II).