Comparison of cardiac troponin in postmortem blood sample of sudden cardiac death and non-cardiac death

Sudden Cardiac Death (SCD) contributes to 80% of sudden deaths. Postmortem diagnosis based on changes in heart is difficult if death occurs at an early stage. Estimation of cardiac Troponin I would be useful. Present study was to find out cTn I level in postmortem blood sample. This cross-sectional study was conducted on 55 cases of cardiac death and non cardiac death with comparison between groups for a period of one year after Institutional Ethics Committee clearance. During autopsy, blood samples were collected and Troponin I estimation was done. Association between the variables were checked using Chi-square test for qualitative variables and student ‘t ’test for continuous variables. Serum Troponin I level among Cardiac Death was 11.1 (SD 13.3) while it was 0.8 (SD 0.7) in Non-Cardiac Death. Optimum cut off value of Troponin I was >1.1 ng/ml with a sensitivity of 98.18 and specificity 87.27. The variation in Troponin I values were significantly different in both groups. Serum Cardiac Troponin I was found to be a good predictor of the SCD.