Why Must Read Spitz and Fisher's Medicolegal Investigation of Death?

I read the previous version of this famous textbook cover to cover when I was in training. I have not yet finished reading this entire new edition but I have digested enough of it that I can make some observations: The Good: Most of the images have been updated to color versions. Also, several chapters on basically defunct material are now absent (things that have not survived Daubert, such as bite mark analysis). The Bad: There are almost no updates to the content of the book. It’s the same old chapters just with color pictures. It’s actually rather infuriating. The chapter on child abuse cites NO medical or scientific references that have been published in scholarly journals in the past 15 years since the previous edition of this book! Same seems to be true for the chapters on radiology, alcohol and cannabis (the ONLY drug chapter in the book), and many others. The neuropathology chapter is better in this regard, but not by much. Indeed, most of the medical and scientific references in the book are from the 1960s through 1990s. The authors/editors deleted the chapter on postmortem laboratory values. I think it would have served the readers well to update this chapter, not omit it. There is no chapter on hypothermia (though individual cases are mentioned in one chapter). Many claims are unsubstantiated by any scientific references (such as how much blood can be lost into interstitial tissues from contusions and related internal hemorrhage). What is most frustrating however is the inclusion in this new edition of discussions of conscious pain and suffering. This is a product of the lead authors post-retirement work as a consultant in civil litigations. Which is a well and good, but, in the discussions where he asserts that the dying experienced conscious pain and suffering, he cites no scholarly sources to substantiate such claims. One example is hypothermia. In a sample case he asserts the hypothermic dying individual experiences pain over all body surfaces, but he does not cite any study of hypothermic cohorts documenting the sensations they experienced during their hypothermic experience. Rather, the reader of this textbook just has to trust the claims of the author. I was very excited for this new edition. It has proved disappointing. I’m sure it will serve the uninitiated well for learning basic concepts (lacerations, entrance wounds, etc). But it is not a particularly valuable resource for established practitioners.