Provide Cause of Death

Registering deaths in Minnesota includes recording the cause and manner of death. Medical certifiers — physicians, medical examiners, coroners, advanced practice registered nurses, and physician assistants — provide the cause of death information. To register a cause of death, one of the following must be true for the medical certifier:  

• Attended the death
• Has direct knowledge of the circumstances of death and access to the deceased person’s medical record
• Is an associate of a medical certifier who treated the deceased before death

When the manner of death is not natural, a medical examiner or coroner with jurisdiction in the county where the death occurred must provide the cause of death.

Providing the cause of death is often the last step in the death registration process:  

1. Funeral home staff register the decedent’s legal and demographic data in Minnesota Registration and Certification (MR&C). 
2. Funeral home staff enter a medical certifier’s name on the death record.  
3. MR&C notifies the medical certifier by email to add the cause and manner of death.
4. The medical certifier/designated staff adds the cause and manner of death to finalize the death record in MR&C. 

Assigned a death record in error? If you were mistakenly notified to provide cause of death (e.g., you didn’t treat the decedent or don’t have knowledge of the death), please reply-all to the email, note the mistake, and provide the correct medical certifier, if you know who it is. The funeral home will reassign the record.  

• The Quick start for medical certifiers (YouTube) video shows how to enter cause of death in MR&C.  
• Review Instructions for Completing the Cause-of-Death Section of the Death Certificate (PDF) for examples of properly completed medical certifications. 

Records referred to medical examiners or coroners

In some cases, certain wording in the cause of death statement will trigger MR&C to send the record to a medical examiner or coroner for review. And if the body will be cremated, a medical examiner or coroner must review the cause of death statement before authorizing final disposition. 

Designated staff

Medical certifiers may designate staff to enter information in MR&C on their behalf, but the designated staff must provide the cause of death statement exactly as written by the medical certifier. Designated staff can print a cause of death worksheet from MR&C to help them gather the necessary information for data entry:  

• Log in to MR&C and click on the “Death” tab at the top.
• Click “Search Death Record” and use the decedent’s file number or name to find the record.
• At the bottom of the page, choose “Print completed death worksheet” from the drop-down list of follow-on actions.
• Click the “Cause of death” option and then “Generate report”.  

The importance of cause of death data

It’s critical to write accurate and meaningful cause of death statements. Public health agencies use death record data for disease surveillance and community health initiatives. In addition, cause-of-death statistics drive health policy decisions, affect government spending, influence insurance premiums, and much more. Minnesota shares its death record information with the National Vital Statistics System (NVSS) at the CDC. NVSS compiles national mortality statistics to inform a variety of research efforts.

The cause and manner of death is your best medical opinion. Medical opinions may vary among individual certifiers. Use these resources to help develop your cause of death statements:

• Death Certification: Writing Cause of Death Statements (CDC)
• Reporting and Coding Deaths Due to COVID-19 (CDC) 

The National Center for Health Statistics at the CDC is encouraging medical certifiers to be careful when marking the checkboxes related to pregnancy: 

• Not pregnant within past year
• Pregnant at time of death
• Not pregnant, but pregnant within 42 days of death
• Not pregnant, but pregnant 43 days to 1 year before death
• Unknown if pregnant within the past year 

Marking the wrong checkbox may mean a record is counted as a maternal death when it's not. Learn more: Verification of Pregnancy Checkbox Information

Correcting cause of death

The medical certifier named on the death certificate may change the cause of death in MR&C at any time. Search for the decedent’s record using the name or state file number. Then select “Correct cause of death” from the drop-down list of follow-on actions at the bottom of the summary page. Indicate a reason for the correction, and you will then have access to correct the record. 

Using MR&C

Medical certifiers and their designated staff must be authorized users of MR&C to enter cause of death information. Complete the Medical Certifier and Designated Staff User Agreement (PDF) to:  

• Add a new user
• Change information for an existing user
• Remove a user

Practice in MR&C

Practice entering birth records using fictitious records, in the MR&C training environment. Email health.vitalrecords@state.mn.us to request access. Include your first and last name, the facility you represent, and your work email address.  

Please provide feedback: Office of Vital Records Customer Satisfaction Survey