hb64_Sen_floor_amend_1_AM_35_0161_8.html
09 AM 35 0161

ADOPTED
Senators Heath of the 31st and Harbison of the 15th offered the following amendment:

Amend the Senate Health and Human Services Committee substitute to HB 64 (LC 35 1511S) by inserting after the semicolon at the end of line 5 the following:
to amend Chapter 16 of Title 45 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating to coroners, so as to provide for certain notification requirements when a death occurs in a different county than where the acts or events resulting in the death occurred;

By inserting between lines 51 and 52 the following:
SECTION 1A.
Chapter 16 of Title 45 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating to coroners, is amended by adding a new subsection to Code Section 45-16-22, relating to medical examiners' inquiries, as follows:
"(f.1) When death occurs in a hospital as a direct result and consequence of acts or events taking place in a county other than the one in which such death occurs, the hospital shall immediately notify the coroner or the county medical examiner of the county in which the acts or events resulting in the death occurred."

SECTION 1B.
Said chapter is further amended in subsection (a) of Code Section 45-16-24, relating to notification of suspicious or unusual deaths, by revising paragraph (9) and the undesignated text at the end of subsection (a) as follows:
"(9) After having been admitted to a hospital in an unconscious state and without regaining consciousness within 24 hours of admission,
it shall be the duty of any law enforcement officer or other person having knowledge of such death to notify immediately the coroner or county medical examiner of the county wherein in which the acts or events resulting in the death occurred or the body is found or death occurs. For the purposes of this Code section, no person shall be deemed to have died unattended when the death occurred while the person was a patient of a hospice licensed under Article 9 of Chapter 7 of Title 31."