While a coroner degree doesn’t exist, most coroners hold a bachelor’s degree or higher.

Coroners and deputy coroners are required to obtain a minimum of 8 hours of continuing education credits in … This means that someone seeking this position will need to go to medical school and become a licensed physician. Both Allegheny and Philadelphia’s medical examiners are the second-highest paid public employees in their counties with salaries of $187,391 (Karl Williams, MD, MPH) and $254,386 (Sam Gulino, MD). Many rural PA towns are too small to afford a professional police department, and in response have formed and empowered a regional policing authority. Overall, there is near unanimous consensus among the medical and legal communities that medical examiner systems are far better than coroner systems at protecting public safety and health. Pooling money in this way could allow for a more centralized and professional office than any one county could afford on its own, and a similar concept is already practiced in the state with regional police departments. All three PA medical examiners are physicians. Professional medical examiner offices need a fair amount of public investment to function. South Philly communications professional passionate about good government, sustainable communities, better health care, fair elections, and local history. In 1877, Massachusetts became the first in the U.S. to replace the elected lay coroner with a physician medical examiner. You can become certified for either Clinical Pathology (CP), Anatomical Pathology (AP), or … There is another problem with the county system. There are 68 Coroners & Medical Examiners in Pennsylvania, serving a population of 12,790,505 people in an area of 44,732 square miles.There is 1 Coroner & Medical Examiner per 188,095 people, and 1 Coroner & Medical Examiner per 657 square miles.. Ann. When someone dies unexpectedly in Pennsylvania, authorities launch a death investigation.

If that person dies in the hospital, the Lehigh County Coroner is now responsible for the death investigation. Sixteen states have centralized medical examiner offices. Becoming a Coroner. Lehigh County is home to two regional trauma centers, which serve much of the Northeast region of the state. That is still far less than the years of medical school and specialized training for professional forensic pathologists. Coroner must obtain additional training in medicolegal death investigation, such as training by the American Board of Medicolegal Death Investigators, within four years of taking office, unless the coroner has already obtained this training. With a change in state law, those counties could reach an agreement to abolish all 11 offices of coroner and establish a regional Lehigh Valley Medical Examiner’s Office with full-time forensic specialists.

Work with coroner and medical examiner’s offices to earn personal certification with the American Board of Pathology to become an officially recognized pathologist. Out of 64 coroners, only one is certified to conduct autopsies. Delaware County was next in 1979, and after decades of failed reform attempts, Allegheny County got a medical examiner in 2005. These are the requirements to become a coroner in Pennsylvania: 18 years or older; A resident of your county for at least one year; The most votes in the election; Complete a one-week certification course within six months of your election; The coroner system has its roots in Colonial America. Lehigh County has been sending invoices to neighboring counties for 24 years, but they rarely receive a response. PA coroners have a variety of backgrounds, including: physician, nurse, paramedic, police officer, and, most commonly, funeral director. Those coroners who also want to perform autopsies must have a degree in pathology. Funding especially can be a major problem for a county-level death investigation system. A 2003 report by the Institute of Medicine, Medicolegal Death Investigation System, described the difference between the two death investigation systems: “Coroners are elected lay people who often do not have professional training, whereas medical examiners are appointed and have board-certification in a medical specialty.”. These are the requirements to become a coroner in Pennsylvania: The coroner system has its roots in Colonial America. It seems clear that the county coroner system does not always work well, and it only requires the political will to fix it. There are 19 regional police departments in Pennsylvania. Residencies may last up to three years.

It’s not clear that system actually saves money. It is possible to ensure that everyone in the state has access to the same service at a fair cost. Nationwide, 27 states, including Pennsylvania, still have coroner systems. There are 67 counties in Pennsylvania, of which, 62 elect a coroner, two appoint a coroner, and three appoint a medical examiner: Allegheny, Delaware, and Philadelphia. Lehigh taxpayers are subsidizing investigations for ten of their PA neighbors. The other 63 counties must hire physicians to conduct autopsies. This can take up to 8 years of additional schooling beyond high school to complete. It is an anachronistic institution which has conclusively demonstrated its incapacity to perform the functions customarily required of it.” Since then, similar recommendations have been made in 1932, 1954, 1968, 1985, 2003, and 2009. It might not make sense to invest in county medical examiner systems in those areas due to high per capita cost and low demand for the service. Good News: Philadelphia HPV Immunization Rates are High, A resident of your county for at least one year, Complete a one-week certification course within six months of your election. Official website of Justin Gero. Minn. Stat. As a result, a person who had an accident in Northampton County, just northeast of Lehigh, may be transported to Lehigh County for medical care. As of the 2010 census Philadelphia and Allegheny counties were first and second in population with 1.5 million and 1.2 million. PA Laws Empowering, Defining and Limiting the Power of the Coroner 1201-B - Applicability 1202-B - Definitions 1211-B - Deputies 1212-B - Duties Regarding County Morgues 1213-B - Removal of Bodies to Morgue 1214-B - Removal of Body, Burial and Vehicle 1215-B - Unclaimed Property and Sales 1216-B - Unclaimed Property of Deceased 1217-B - Requests for Examinations and Reports § 390.005. The state of Pennsylvania is ranked 36th in Coroners & Medical Examiners per capita, and 18th in Coroners & Medical Examiners per square mile. These offices are responsible for more territory, but the collective funding allows departments to hire more staff and more specialists including detectives and forensic experts.

Delaware County is the fifth-most populous with 558,979. Pennsylvania may be able to accomplish that through a regional or centralized statewide system. A quality investigation is important; it can be an effective tool to protect public safety and health. For years, Dr. Hofman has been critical of the system that has elected him.
The average salary for coroners in Pennsylvania is around $66,820 per year. In Pennsylvania, the person in charge of determining the cause of death and issuing a death certificate is either the county coroner or medical examiner. It seems clear that there is a huge gap in training and skill between most coroners and medical examiners, and the county-based system makes it difficult for smaller counties to hire professional medical examiners. As the system stands, the quality of Pennsylvania’s death investigation varies from county-to-county. Ohio Coroner Carl Parrott, MD and Texas Medical Examiner Vincent DiMaio, MD argued: “The endurance of the coroner system is best explained by voter inertia, lack of awareness of the problem, and high capital expenditures for [medical examiner] system start up.”. Most areas will require that the coroner be a medical doctor. By contrast, Cameron, Sullivan, and Forest counties each have less than 8,000 people.

The situation in Lehigh is already a quasi-regional death investigation system. New York City followed in 1918. The coroner system is steeped in the vagaries of history rather than in a forward-looking, planned system that capitalizes on professional depth and knowledge.Medicolegal Death Investigation System, 2003. Review this site's Privacy Policy. Forensic Pathologist Marcella Fierro, MD, said: “The major advantages of a statewide medical examiner system are the quality of death investigations and forensic pathology services and their independence from population size, county budget variation, and politics.”. A coroner was the Crown’s representative responsible for investigating death.

Roughly half of the state’s population resides in nine counties (Southeastern PA and Allegheny County), and the other half spread out through the other 58 counties. And yet, despite nearly a century of calls for reform, the vast majority of PA counties (95.5% of counties containing 73.9% of the population) still elect coroners. But in Pennsylvania, the question is not if we should spend taxpayer money for professional death investigations, but if we’re spending taxpayer money well. He recently announced his retirement after 50 years in forensic pathology, and told the Philadelphia Inquirer that Pennsylvania should end the political office of coroner and replace it with medical examiners who are hired based on their qualifications. In an attempt to professionalize the coroner system, the state requires that all elected coroners attend a taxpayer-funded one-week, 40-hour training course. Montgomery County’s elected coroner, Walter I. Hofman, MD, is the only coroner in Pennsylvania who is also a licensed forensic pathologist, and therefore the only coroner in the state who is certified to conduct autopsies. In 1951, Philadelphia was the first PA county to replace the coroner with a medical examiner. The problem with both these statewide fixes is that they require changes in state law, and it isn’t a priority for Harrisburg.

Recently Lehigh County Coroner Scott Grim has complained for years that Lehigh County taxpayers are paying for accident and criminal investigations that occurred in ten other PA counties. So although the counties can hire coroners for about $100,000 less than a medical examiner, they still have to hire or contract with additional highly-skilled support staff to do the tasks that a coroner can’t. So why then do we still elect coroners instead of simply hiring a qualified medical professional? The National Academy of Sciences published its first recommendation on this subject in 1928, The Coroner and the Medical Examiner, recommending that, “the office of coroner be abolished. Salaries typically start from $39,650 and go up to $110,930. 37 Pa. Code § 199.24. A licensed forensic pathologist may be exempt from the requirement of attendance at the Basic Education Course and completion of the examination.