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Compassionate Care
Religious leaders sensitize Oakland medical
examiner to needs of 'Jewish dead.
HARRY KIRSBAUM
StaffWriter
A
death is already hard to deal
with for any family, but
when it involves an
Orthodox Jewish family, the
delay in burial due to autopsy flies in
the face of religious beliefs.
According to Jewish law, an entire
body must be brought to burial. Any
invasive procedure is
seen as desecration;
any delay in burial is
painful to the spirit.
When the
Oakland County
Medical Examiner's
office added staff to
perform autopsies
Dr. Dragovic
on Sundays last
November, it
brought its relation-
ship to Jewish reli-
gious leaders even
closer.
"In the past,
when a person who
died on a Saturday
Rabbi Freedman needed an autopsy,
the body wouldn't
be released until mid-afternoon on
Monday," said David Techner of the Ira
Kaufman Chapel. "Families understand
why an autopsy has to be performed,
but having to wait 36 or 48 hours
because [the medical examiner's office
is] closed seemed particularly difficult,
adding insult to injury to the family."
Oakland County Medical Examiner
Dr. Ljubisa Dragovic said he has been in
touch with Jewish religious leaders for
years, discussing ways to "help people
minimize their terrible experience of
loss."
When Dr. Dragovic invited a group
of Jewish religious leaders to tour the
new $10.2 million medical examiner's
building last July, the issue was raised
again.
Oakland County commissioners
recently approved additional staffing;
autopsies began on a seven-day schedule
in January According to Dr. Dragovic,
Harty Kirsbaum can be reached at
(248) 354-6060, ext. 244, or by e-:mail
at h kirsb aum @th ej etc, isbnews corn
2/11
2000
16
the number of autopsies performed
from his office has nearly doubled to
1,100 a year. According to Michigan
law, an autopsy must be performed
when death is unexpected or violent.
"Whenever there is initiative from
the community, we have to address these
issues," Dr. Dragovic said. "We have to
investigate expediently in order to mini-
mize the already existing grief"
He cited great support from county
leadership to put some technical logistics
in place.
Rabbi E.B. "Bunny" Freedman of the
Southfield-based Jewish Hospice and
Chaplaincy Network said communica-
tions between the medical examiner's
office and Jewish religious leaders greatly
improved after Dr. Dragovic started in
1992.
"When I have a concern and a family
asks me to intercede, I go down there,
they treat me with respect, and give me
a place to work with the family;" he said.
"They give us complete access."
Dr. Dragovic has shown compassion
in minimizing autopsies to Orthodox
Jewish bodies, said Rabbi. Steven Weil of
Young Israel of Oak Park
"On two occasions, which were sui-
cides, I was able to come down to the
medical examiner's office, and all that
was done was some bodily fluids were
taken," he said.
Rabbi Weil was among a group of
rabbis and Jewish funeral directors that
sent Jewish guidelines on autopsy proce-
dures and post-mortem care to the med-
ical examiner.
"If you try to apply any law without
sensitivity to needs of the people within
the community, then you're not going to
do your public duty as best as possible,"
said Dr. Dragovic. "If you look at the
ways to do it in the most humane and
most reasonable way, and still enforce
the law, then you can accomplish all
these tasks."
"I give [Dr. Dragovic] a.ton of credit
here because, basically, the medical
examiner doesn't have to appeal to any
member of the community. They can
just say, 'Hey, I have to do an autopsy;
and I'm going to do
said Techner.
"He really wants the Jewish commu-
nity to understand his role, and he's
been very professional and compassion-
ate about it."
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