National Forensic Doctor
Chapter 467 - 467 430

467: 430 467: 430 “A female between the ages of 33 to 36, 163 centimeters tall, weighing around 110 jin.

Type A blood, long hair, about 34 years old, has given birth, frequently bends over for work, often climbs mountains…

she must be a resident of an upstream township or village…”

Medical Examiner Zhai’s foundation in forensic anthropology was very strong.

During his last collaboration with Jiang Yuan, he had exhibited a level 2 PLUS standard.

This time in Longli County, Medical Examiner Zhai concentrated his efforts and did his best to show his finest qualities.

The eight young forensic doctors who came for the training were taking notes and listening attentively, each one serious in their demeanor.

One of them, who had a way with words, commented with a laugh following Medical Examiner Zhai’s explanation, “Medical Examiner Zhai is truly amazing; looking at just a single bone for a few minutes, he comes up with a series of anthropological judgments.

Unbeatable.”

Medical Examiner Zhai, a little old man who had spent years working with corpses, was not often praised and smiled bashfully as he said, “There’s nothing unbeatable about it, I can hardly understand what you young people are saying these days.”

“You can understand what corpses say, and that’s what’s really impressive,” the talkative forensic doctor slapped on the flattery with two smacks.

Medical Examiner Zhai was quite pleased; setting down the bone, he smiled and said, “They say forensic doctors listen to what corpses have to say, but it’s not so easy.

However, with the rapid innovation of technology, who knows where forensic technology will be by the time you reach my age…”

“It won’t get to the point where we actually make corpses talk,” another forensic doctor interjected.

“To tell you the truth, some corpses, even if you asked them to talk, probably couldn’t clarify how they died.

In the end, it’s up to us to help read the signs.”

“Conversing with the corpses while conducting autopsies, huh?

That sounds pretty engaging.”

“Many surgeons do just that, performing local anesthesia on patients, chatting with them during surgery, and getting praised afterwards for their good surgical manner.”

“In all fairness, I suppose even if a corpse didn’t like our manner, it couldn’t really complain.”

“That it couldn’t.

Instead of complaining, it might as well solve its own case.”

Cough cough.

Initially, Medical Examiner Zhai was rather amused, but as the conversation went on, it reached a point he could no longer listen to, and he interjected “Back to looking at the bones…”

Gradually, everyone quieted down and returned to watching Medical Examiner Zhai handle the bones and discuss them.

Medical Examiner Zhai himself was also making judgments through this very process.

He had been examining the bones for two days, but had yet to make a breakthrough.

Fortunately, with age, Medical Examiner Zhai understood that not making a breakthrough was the norm—often times the bodies of ordinary people after death are just that, ordinary cadavers, without anything distinctive to be found, sometimes even lacking significant marks on their bones…

There were many residents upstream of the Lishou River, several towns and villages had been built along it, and when considering the area where the body was found, within 10 kilometers upstream there were relatively densely populated areas.

Not to mention, disposing of the body had to be taken into account.

If the victim had ever broken a leg, had bone screws installed, or dental implants, was missing half an ear, or had suffered broken ribs, severe rheumatoid arthritis with gout, it would be somewhat easier to find them…

“Let’s talk about this patella today,” said Medical Examiner Zhai, nonchalantly picking up a knee bone.

“In forensic anthropology, the value of the patella is considered to be second tier.

Everyone knows that for forensic doctors, the pelvis is the most valuable—it can accurately and easily determine gender, age, reproductive status in females, and through various calculations, it can help estimate height, and even weight…

Generally speaking, if you have the pelvis, there’s no need to look at the patella.

But…”

“As forensic doctors, we encounter special cases, like dismemberment: the police may only find the lower body or maybe just a leg.

What do we do then?

The most common are explosion cases, not just explosives, but also gas explosions, restaurant pressure cooker explosions, and so on; in explosion cases, it’s quite common to find cases where the upper body is obliterated, leaving only the lower limb bones.”

Holding a corpse’s knee, Medical Examiner Zhai continued, “To determine the gender of the patella is relatively difficult.

First, you need to measure the height of the bone, the width and volume of the medial and lateral articular surfaces, and so on, then there’s a series of regression formulas…

As for age, it mainly involves observing various changes to bone quality on the different bone surfaces…”

The more he spoke, the more excited he became; after all, judging the patella required considerable technical skill and was very much fitting with the status of a provincial forensic doctor.

Medical Examiner Zhai looked down at the young forensic doctors listening intently below and appeared quite satisfied.

As long as they were willing to listen carefully, these young forensic doctors in front of him could at least take some basic knowledge of forensic anthropology with them.

When they encountered a case in the future, even if they couldn’t solve it themselves, at least they would know whom to ask for help, how to preserve evidence properly, and where to take photographs…

As a Level 2.7 forensic anthropologist, Medical Examiner Zhai could very well exhibit the prowess of Level 2.8 or 2.9 today, showing great ease.

In other words, Medical Examiner Zhai was almost at Level 3.

In terms of forensic anthropological skills, within Shannan Province, aside from Jiang Yuan, he was at the peak among forensic doctors.

In fact, Jiang Yuan’s forensic anthropology was also at Level 3, but having worked on cases in the province for so long, he had not encountered another forensic doctor with comparable skills.

Of course, this was also related to his increasingly comprehensive set of skills.

Level 3 in Forensic Clinical Medicine, Level 4 in Forensic Pathology, Level 4 in Forensic Material Evidence, plus Level 6 in postmortem interval estimation, along with the current Level 3 in Skull Restoration Skill, definitely promoted the advancement of forensic anthropology.