Sign of death

Death signs are certain characteristic changes of the body that occur after death. A distinction is made between certain and uncertain signs of death. The sure signs of death include lividity, rigor mortis and corpse rot.

At least one of these signs must be present for a person to be declared dead. Exceptions to this are injuries that are incompatible with life. These include, for example, a brain death determined by an EEG or a 30-minute unsuccessful attempt at resuscitation.

Corpse marks are caused by accumulations of blood in the deepest parts of the body after internal bleeding. Therefore, corpses lying on their backs usually have dark spots on the back. Rigor mortis, which is pronounced all over the body, usually sets in six to eight hours after death.

This is due to the lack of energy in the form of ATP in the muscle, which is actually necessary for the release of the myosin heads from the actin filaments (among the uncertain signs of death are respiratory arrest, a lack of pulse, lack of reflexes, pale skin, lack of muscle tone and cooling of the body. These signs are considered uncertain because they can occur in other situations without the person having died. For example, a person may not have a pulse after a heart attack, but there is still a small window of time during which resuscitation can take place, as brain death has not yet occurred. Only when brain death is diagnosed by an EEG, people are considered clinically dead.

What happens when you die of cancer?

Normally, the formation of cancer cells is not directly fatal for humans. Rather, it is the consequences of growth, such as constriction of other structures, loss of function or increased energy requirements, which ultimately lead to death. In particular, metastasized tumors that spread throughout the body are fatal, as they affect many organs and often grow rapidly.The big difference in the growth of benign tumors is that benign tumors only displace other structures, whereas malignant tumors infiltrate and destroy the surrounding tissue.

If this happens to a large extent in the lungs, the airways become narrowed and the oxygen uptake can be reduced to such an extent that death can occur due to the lack of oxygen in the blood. If this occurs in the kidneys, toxins can no longer be eliminated from the body and the body is slowly poisoned. This then leads to multi-organ failure. The effects of a tumor ultimately depend on the type and location of the tumor.