Medical institutions frequently encounter the requirements of the survivors - grieving relatives - that the deceased person not to be examined postmortem especially in view of reverence of the body. The first author - physician with a legal education - presents an attempt to elucidate cases, when these requirements are to be met and those, where postmortem examination should be amust. The Czech law differentiates two kinds of postmortem examinations - medical postmortem and the judicial postmortem, respectively. The medical postmortem is a compulsory examination or that based of a decision of the examining physician. The judicial postmortem is ordered by criminal case legal authorities in case the person is suspected to have died due to criminal causes.

        Key words: medical postmortem, judicial postmortem, medical institution, requirements of grieving relatives