Table 3.

Publications comparing MITS with CDA.

First Author	Year	Journal	Specific Study Objective	Population Studied	Total MITS Conducted	Results
West [38]	1957	American Journal of Medical Science	Compare diagnosis made by MITS to CDA	Adults	66	77% of MITS cases were able to reach a diagnosis In 48% of the cases there was agreement between MITS and CDA
Foroudi [42]	1995	Pathology	Compare results of MITS with CDA	Adults	21	Cause of death ascertained in 43% of MITS cases compared to 95% of CDA
Huston [43]	1996	Modern Pathology	Demonstrate the value and limitations of postmortem needle sampling in correlating tissue diagnosis compared with CDA	Adults	20	Cause of death was confirmed by MITS in 60% of the patients MITS confirmed additional diagnosis identified by CDA in 75% of the cases
Cina [67]	1999	Military Medicine	Evaluate the role of percutaneous core biopsy of the liver in determining pathology in unexpected deaths related to hepatomegaly	Adults	28	86% correlation between MITS and CDA
Breeze [73]	2008	Virchows Archive	Determine the feasibility of percutaneous fetal organ biopsies: how frequently are adequate samples obtained; comparison of percutaneous biopsy with conventional block biopsy	Stillbirths	30	46% of samples collected via MITS were considered adequate Adequate samples were obtained from lungs and liver
Garg [22]	2009	Fetal and Pediatric Pathology	Compare the specimen adequacy and histologic and laboratory findings on lung tissue collected using blind-needle biopsy MITS with those from CDA in a pediatric respiratory disease mortality study undertaken at a large public hospital in Kenya, assessing the contribution of molecular microbiologic testing	Neonates	25	Full agreement between CDA and MITS in 56% of cases Partial agreement between CDA and MITS in 12% of cases
Van der Linden [74]	2014	PLoS One	Compare the RNA quality of samples obtained via MITS to samples obtained via CDA with fresh frozen samples as a reference	Adults	24	Samples obtained via MITS had higher quality RNA compared with those collected via CDA
Castillo [27]	2016	PLoS Medicine	Compare cause of death in adults ascertained via MITS with cause of death after CDA	Adults	112	75.9% agreement in MITS and CDA in cause of death determination Able to ascertain cause of death in 89% of MITS cases and 100% of CDA cases
Castillo [10]	2017	PLoS Medicine	Compare cause of death in maternal cases ascertained via MITS with cause of death after CDA	Adults	57	68% agreement between MITS and CDA in cause of death Able to ascertain cause of death in 84% of MITS cases compared with 98% of CDA
Bassat [31]	2017	PLoS Medicine	Compare cause of death in children ascertained via MITS with cause of death after CDA	Children	54	89% concordance in cause of death between MITS and CDA
Menendez [32]	2017	PLoS Medicine	Compare cause of death in stillbirths ascertained via MITS with cause of death after CDA	Stillbirths and neonates	59	68% agreement between CDA and MITS Cause of death ascertained in 83% of MITS cases compared with 89% of CDA cases
Fernandes [75]	2019	Human Pathology	Determine the degree to which clinical information improves the diagnostic accuracy of the CDA and MIA	Adults	112	Cause of death was ascertained in 89% of MITS cases (all populations) that included clinical information compared with 80% of MITS cases without clinical data
				Maternal deaths	57
				Children	54
				Neonates	41
				Stillbirths	18