SPOTLIGHTS MEDICAL EXAMINER
Sexual Assault Kit Initiative – Online Victim Portal Through an ongoing federally funded grant initiative, the Allegheny County Police Department, Office of the Medical Examiner, and other collaborators have worked with the Department of Information Technology to develop an online victim portal for victims of sexual assault. As continual work on the Sexual Assault Kit Initiative (SAKI) program happens, ACOME has served as a point of contact through the grantor to set an example for other organizations in this initiative. Permission has been requested from ACOME to use tools such as the Consent for Information Sharing, which is used to provide active consent between departments and the SAKI Liaison for better communication of vital information. Also, ACOME has become a point of contact for questions that span the target areas of both the sexual assault investigation initiatives as well medicolegal death investigations. Community Outreach Programs The Office of the Medical Examiner (ACOME) has resumed community outreach programs that were suspended during the COVID-19 pandemic. This includes the 12-week forensic internship program for college students or graduates interested in pursuing a career in forensic science or medicolegal death investigation. This career-building opportunity involves a minimum of 120 hours of on-site experience including rotational lectures through all forensic disciplines, preparation and presentation of research projects, and formal interview practice.
ACOME has also resumed its lecture/tour program, which is open to local schools, community groups, and professional organizations. This two-hour program is offered once a month and includes a lecture presentation providing a general overview of the office and a building tour that includes portions of both the Morgue Operations and the Forensic Laboratory Divisions. Finally, ACOME has resumed professional trainings for local law enforcement agencies in evidence collection including latent prints and trace evidence. These trainings provide outside agencies with knowledge and confidence when collecting evidence during their investigations, and as a result, improve the quality of the evidence submissions to the laboratory. Streamlined Purchasing Workflow The ACOME Fiscal/Purchasing Section recently completed an overhaul of the internal purchasing procedures for the Medical Examiner’s Office. Using the office’s Qualtrax document management system, the Accreditation Specialist created an online workflow to manage the internal submissions and approvals for purchase orders and vendor invoice payments. This new streamlined workflow eliminated an old paper form and multiple e-mail steps, while ensuring that all purchase order requests and vouchers go through the appropriate internal approvals prior to being entered into the County Purchasing processes.
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