Arkansas Administrative Code › Agency 007 - ARKANSAS DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH › Division 33 - Division of Health Related Boards and Commissions › Rule 007.33.22-011 - Rule 34 - Death Certificates

Current through Register Vol. 49, No. 6, June, 2024
ACA §
								20-18-601
				requires physicians in the State of Arkansas to comply with the requirements
				when completing death certificates. ACA §
								17-95-409(a)(2)(P)
				provides that the Arkansas State Medical Board may revoke or suspend a license
				of physicians, or impose other sanctions as provided by law, if a licensed
				physician violates a rule of the Board.
A. A licensed Physician who has been in
			 charge of a patient's care for the illness or condition that resulted in the
			 death of the patient shall complete, sign and return to the funeral director
			 the medical certification on the death certificate within three (3) business
			 days after receipt of the death certificate, except when an inquiry is required
			 by law pursuant to ACA §
								12-12-315
			 as set forth herein:
(1) The county coroner,
			 prosecuting attorney, and either the county sheriff or the chief of police of
			 the municipality in which the death of a human being occurs shall be promptly
			 notified by any physician, law enforcement officer, undertaker or embalmer,
			 jailer, or coroner or by any other person present with knowledge of the death
			 if:
(A) The death appears to be caused by
			 violence or appears to be the result of a homicide or a suicide or to be
			 accidental;
(B) The death appears
			 to be the result of the presence of drugs or poisons in the body;
(C) The death appears to be the result of a
			 motor vehicle accident, or the body was found in or near a roadway or
			 railroad;
(D) The death appears to
			 be the result of a motor vehicle accident and there is no obvious trauma to the
			 body;
(E) The death occurs while
			 the person is in a state mental institution or hospital and there is no
			 previous medical history to explain the death, or while the person is in police
			 custody or jail other than a jail operated by the Department of
			 Correction;
(F) The death appears
			 to be the result of a fire or an explosion;
(G) The death of a minor child appears to
			 indicate child abuse prior to death;
(H) Human skeletal remains are recovered or
			 an unidentified deceased person is discovered;
(I) Postmortem decomposition exists to the
			 extent that an external examination of the corpse cannot rule out injury, or in
			 which the circumstances of death cannot rule out the commission of a
			 crime;
(J) The death appears to be
			 the result of drowning;
(K) The
			 death is of an infant or a minor child under eighteen (18) years of
			 age;
(L) The manner of death
			 appears to be other than natural;
(M) The death is sudden and
			 unexplained;
(N) The death occurs
			 at a work site;
(O) The death is
			 due to a criminal abortion;
(P) The
			 death is of a person where a physieian was not in attendance within thirty-six
			 (36) hours preceding death, or, in prediagnosed terminal or bedfast cases,
			 within thirty (30) days;
(Q) A
			 person is admitted to a hospital emergency room unconscious and is
			 unresponsive, with cardiopulmonary resuscitative measures being performed, and
			 dies within twenty-four (24) hours of admission without regaining consciousness
			 or responsiveness, unless a physician was in attendance within thirty-six (36)
			 hours preceding presentation to the hospital, or, in cases in which the
			 decedent had a prediagnosed terminal or bedfast condition, unless a physician
			 was in attendance within thirty (30) days preceding presentation to the
			 hospital;
(R) The death occurs in
			 the home; or
(S)
(i) The death poses a potential threat to
			 public health or safety.
(ii) Upon
			 receiving notice of a death that poses a potential threat to public health or
			 safety, the county coroner shall immediately notify the Department of
			 Health.