OK Forensic Pathology

🩸 Part 3 of 3: Lividity vs. Contusions

We’re wrapping up our livor mortis mini-series with one of the most practical forensic questions:

Is it postmortem lividity… or is it bruising?

That distinction matters.

Lividity develops after death as blood settles by gravity. Contusions occur before death (generally speaking...eek) from blunt force injury, with blood escaping into the tissues.

To tell the difference, forensic pathologists look at:

🔎 Distribution
🖐️ Blanching
🔪 Incision findings
🧩 Pattern and margins
📍 Scene context

Because in forensic pathology, the answer rarely comes from one finding alone. It comes from putting the whole picture together.

Thanks for following along with our first educational mini-series! More forensic pathology topics are coming as we continue sharing the science, training, and work behind what we do at the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.

Pathology residents and medical students 👀
If this kind of work interests you, come train with us in Oklahoma.

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Every year, teams across Oklahoma come together with one shared goal:
help bring answers to families of missing loved ones.

Tomorrow, on May 2, the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME) will partner with OSBI (.ok ) and multiple local agencies for Missing in Oklahoma Day, an event dedicated to supporting ongoing missing persons investigations and unidentified cases.

This event provides families with the opportunity to:
• File new reports or update existing cases
• Share critical information
• Submit DNA to assist with identification and genealogical searches

We are especially proud of our Forensic Anthropology team (Carlos, Sara, Tim, and Angela) for the work they do year-round on these cases, and for their role in helping make events like this possible.

This is what forensic science looks like beyond the lab: collaboration, persistence, and a commitment to answers.

If you or someone you know may benefit from this event, we encourage you to attend.

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Match Day is always special… and this year is no exception. 🎉

We are incredibly excited to officially welcome our 2027–2028 Forensic Pathology Fellows to the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner:

🔬 OKC: Dr. Gilberto Vento (Mercedes, Texas)
🔬 Tulsa: Dr. Roberta Bilberry (Albuquerque, New Mexico)

We cannot wait to have you both join us in July 2027 and become part of our OCME team. The future is bright, and we’re honored you chose to train with us.

To all of the candidates who interviewed with us this season, thank you. Truly. The level of talent, passion, and dedication we saw this year was outstanding. And to everyone who matched across the country today… congratulations. This is going to be an incredible year for forensic pathology.

We’re excited for what’s ahead for all of you. 👏

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Ever wondered what happens after the heart stops?

We’re kicking off a new mini-series on one of the earliest and most important postmortem changes: livor mortis.

This is Part 1 of 3, breaking down the science behind postmortem discoloration: what it is, why it happens, and how it helps us interpret the story a body can tell.

At the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, education is a huge part of what we do, not just for our fellows, but for anyone interested in forensic pathology. These posts are a way for us to keep sharing that knowledge, even in between real-world highlights and agency updates. Hopefully, we can keep addressing topics, one by one, for all of you!

So if you’ve been following along and wondering where we’ve been, we’re still here. Still learning. Still teaching. Still training the next generation of forensic pathologists.

And if you’re a pathology resident or medical student thinking about forensics…
👀 We’d love to have you in Oklahoma.

Stay tuned for Lividity Parts 2 and 3!

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UPDATE: Tulsa understood the assignment. 📸👏

And honestly… this is exactly what we needed.

Huge shoutout to our Tulsa administrative team for bringing the energy, the personality, and the smiles. 💛 These are the faces behind the emails, the schedules, the coordination, and the countless moving parts that keep everything running smoothly every single day.

This is what makes a workplace special! It is not just the work, but the people behind it. 🙌

We appreciate you more than you know.

And we have a feeling our OKC office's administrative team has just as much personality and energy ready to go 😊
Now that the assignment is out there… we’d love to see it! 📸 We know you’re out there, we know you follow along, so don’t be shy. Send some pictures up the turnpike! We can’t wait to highlight you, too! 💛

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Today we recognize Administrative Professionals Day, and while we couldn’t quite get everyone together for a group photo (because they’re busy keeping everything running), one day still doesn’t come close to covering what this group does for our office. 👏

Behind every case, every report, every schedule, every fellow rotation, every meeting that actually happens when it’s supposed to… there’s an administrative professional quietly making it all work. 🧠📋

At the OCME, they are the connective tissue of everything we do.

They keep the office running, the communication flowing, and the countless moving pieces aligned, often behind the scenes, but always essential. 🔄

On the fellowship side, we see it every day. They play a huge role in keeping our program organized, our fellows supported, and everything moving forward. They help keep people where they need to be, when they need to be there, and that matters more than most people realize. 🎯

It’s work that doesn’t always get the spotlight, but it should.

Your work matters. It makes a difference every single day. And this place does not function without you. 💛

We’re incredibly grateful for everything you do.

Thank you for keeping this place running. 🙌

🦴🏆 Big congratulations to Dr. Timothy Gocha, an OCME forensic anthropologist, on receiving the 2026 Ellis R. Kerley Award from the American Academy of Forensic Sciences! 🎉👏

This prestigious honor recognizes the single AAFS presentation each year that best advances forensic anthropology research, and Tim’s award-winning work on histological age estimation from the femoral midshaft is a remarkable example of that innovation. The results are especially exciting in older adults, where traditional methods have historically struggled, with average error rates of less than 5 years even into the 10th decade of life.

Since joining the OCME, Tim has already become an invaluable part of our agency and fellowship program, bringing daily case expertise and hands-on teaching that continues to strengthen the multidisciplinary education we are proud to provide. 📚🔬🦴

We are proud to celebrate this well-deserved recognition now and look forward to congratulating him in person when the award is formally presented at AAFS 2027. For future collaborators, trainees, and prospective forensic pathology fellows, we hope to see you there meeting Tim and many of the outstanding people who make OCME such a special place to learn and work. ✈️🤝🖤💛

🩺🔬 As National Public Health Week came to a close last week, we wanted to take a moment to reflect on the powerful connection between public health and forensic pathology.

Public health doesn’t stop at the bedside; it continues through medicolegal death investigation. 🖤💛 From identifying emerging overdose trends 💊, infectious diseases 🦠, transportation fatalities ✈️🚗, and violence-related deaths, the work performed in the autopsy suite helps inform safer communities and stronger prevention efforts.

👩‍⚕️📚 For our forensic pathology fellows, this connection is a vital part of training. Every case is not only an opportunity to determine cause and manner of death, but also to understand the larger story of why deaths happen, and how future lives may be protected through surveillance 📊, education, and system-level change.

✨ Even as Public Health Week has ended, the mission continues every day in forensic pathology training: transforming individual loss into knowledge that can help protect future lives.

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✨ Celebrating 35 incredible years of service! ✨

This past week, our OKC office had the privilege of celebrating Annette’s 35-year anniversary with the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. 🖤💛

As a division manager, Annette has spent decades helping keep the work of our agency moving forward. Whether it be organizing reports, coordinating death certificates, and a myriad of other duties, she has served and continues to serve as one of the most familiar and trusted faces our physicians, staff, and fellows work with every day. Her dedication helps ensure that families, investigators, attorneys, hospitals, and communities across Oklahoma receive the timely and accurate documentation they depend on.

For many of our fellows and faculty, Annette is one of the first people they truly get to know in the office. Her knowledge, consistency, and willingness to help make her an invaluable part of both our daily workflow and our training environment.

The service pins marking 20, 30, and now 35 years are such a meaningful reflection of a career built on commitment, excellence, and heart.

Congratulations, Annette, and thank you for 35 years of extraordinary service to our agency and to the people of Oklahoma. 🎉⭐

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🚁🏛️ Forensic pathology at the State Capitol? Absolutely.

This week, OCME was proud to represent the medicolegal side of Oklahoma innovation at the 2026 AERO Oklahoma Day at the State Capitol rotunda.

As one of only a select group of government drone exhibitors, Investigator Philip Miller and District 4 Investigator Johnathan Aston showcased how the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner uses drone technology to support medicolegal death investigations, from aerial scene mapping to complex outdoor recoveries 📸🛰️⚖️

Sharing space with partners like OHP, Oklahoma Task Force-1, and Tulsa Fire, the day highlighted how aviation, aerospace, unmanned systems, and defense continue to shape Oklahoma’s future, and how the OCME is part of that conversation 💙

For our fellows, this is another reminder that training here extends far beyond the autopsy suite. Fellowship at OCME means exposure to scene response, investigators, radiology, anthropology, public service, and the innovative tools that continue to modernize forensic investigations 🔬🦴🚁

We love being able to show future applicants that forensic pathology training in Oklahoma means becoming part of an office recognized statewide for teamwork, technology, and forward-thinking medicolegal practice.

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