A Computer System to Retrieve Forensic Medical Data Using the Internet

A database system was designed, created and tested which enables users to easily retrieve forensic medical information, such as autopsy reports. The system was designed utilizing the World Wide Web, which at present is the most popular application for accessing the Internet. The hardware of this system consisted of two main parts: a server computer providing the service and a client computer requesting the service. Information could be accessed at any time by client machines that were Internet subscribers. The ease of “point and click” searching for terms of interest was a particular benefit of this system. The other advantage of this system was that graphic images could also be obtained. Graphic images can be very useful for forensic scientists. For example, the ability to display images of organs promotes the understanding of autopsies. It was found that the Internet was a very useful tool for forensic research.