Cause of death.......

[Jen~Ealogy]

CEREBRITIS COMPLICATED ?

COULD THIS BE CEREBRAL........TO DO WITH THE BRAIN?

From the death cert of my great grandmother's baby sister who died at 3 years.

[Elaine ..Spain]

Definition of Cerebritis:

* Cerebritis is an infection of the brain, which normally leads to the formation of an abscess within the brain itself.
* Inflammation of cerebrum or lead poisoning

[Uncle John]

itis is inflammation so cerebritis sounds like inflammation of the brain. Could be meningitis.

[Jen~Ealogy]

Thankyou Elaine & John........never thought about meningitis John, could have been I suppose, even if abscess was present.
I know people used to get lead poisoning a lot years ago.

[Peter Evans]

Can I make a correction here? Strictly the suffix -itis does not mean "inflammation" as such. It is the adjectival ending to describe the word "nosos" (disease). In many cases there will be an inflammation but not always.

Peter

[Trina]

So technically "itis" means diseased? Interesting.

[Christine in Herts]

I believe that the meninges refers to the outer layer of the brain... like brain-skin. So meningitis would involve problems with the outer covering, rather than the brain itself.

Christine

[Peter Evans]

Trina,

I am afraid I haven't made myself clear; -itis is merely a suffix indicating that the word is an adjective just as, say, -ic, or -ical, or -itious might. It is the omitted "nosos" that means disease. So "cerebritis" means "pertaining to the brain" with the word for disease left out.

Peter

[Lyn A]

Sorry, Peter....the dictionary (I've checked 3) says that itis is "a suffix meaning inflamation of."

[Jen~Ealogy]

So as it was recorded as complicated, it could have been any number of diseases, Perhaps something they themselves (the doctors) were not exactly sure off?

[Olde Crone Holden]

I think the best that can be said for death certs is that they record the event which stopped the person breathing!

"Died from massive injuries caused by falling under a bus" does not record, for instance, that the deceased was blind, or walked with a stick, or had Downs Syndrome or had had cancer previously, or any other number of chronic conditions.

My mother's death cert gives cod as "myocardial infarction" which is true, she died of a massive heart attack.

It does not record the fact that she had suffered from severe RA for many years, was virtually immobile and took massive doses of steroids, all of which can lead to a heart attack. To a stranger, her death cert reads as if she was a vigorously healthy woman who dropped dead from a heart attack.

A friend had terminal lung cancer and was in his last month of projected life. He died of a heart attack sitting at the kitchen table and this is recorded as the primary cause of death, (heart attack, not the kitchen table!) although admittedly carcinoma is listed as second cause of death.

OC

[Peter Evans]

Lyn,

At the risk of appearing excessively stubborn and pedantic I stand by my claim that the suffix -itis merely turns the part of the body into an adjective to describe a disease. of course most such diseases manifest inflammation.

Peter

[kylejustin]

yes, oc, i agree that certs just say what caused the death, but here in aus, it is compulsory to indicate any illness a person was suffering from at the time of death, even if it was just a cold. i understand english death certs are pretty sketchy.

[Olde Crone Holden]

kylejustin

English death certs often have up to three causes of death on them, the first one is the "event which caused the death" and the other two causes are illnesses evident at the time, or other medical factors which may have led to the actual cause of death.

This is relatively recent however and the further back you go with death certs, the less information you get about why they died, and I suspect a lot of the time it was just a guess.

The point is, I suppose, that death certs are not intended by the authorities to be a historical biography, lol, they are just there to record the fact that someone died and whether or not they died of foul play.

As they are also used for statistical purposes, the cod needs to be something recognisable to a clerk inputting into a database!

The cod on my late father's certificate was so obscure, the Registrar got rather cross and had to phone the hospital for guidance on how to code it. We suspected then, and still do, that no one could really decide what caused my father's sudden death, but there were no suspicious circumstances and they had to put SOMETHING down, so made up some jargony burble.

OC

[kylejustin]

well, medical knowledge can only get better in time. kind of scary that doctors couldn't tell in these last two century's hey?

[Christine in Herts]

Lyn,

At the risk of appearing excessively stubborn and pedantic I stand by my claim that the suffix -itis merely turns the part of the body into an adjective to describe a disease. of course most such diseases manifest inflammation.

Peter

I suspect we're into the same realms of the physicists/mathematicians who complain about references to centrifugal force in lieu of inertia. "-itis" has escaped into the community to be used inaccurately. Fortunately, there is consensus on what it means when it's used colloquially.

Christine