Causes of Death and Physicians’ Knowledge‐Producing Responsibility—How Expectations Shape Interest in ‘Finding Out What Happened’

Clinical knowledge production is fundamentally centred on patient problems, improving the lives of patients. If patients die, physicians also need to administer death. What is their responsibility to generate knowledge about causes of death? Based on semi-structured interviews with 35 physicians, we show what sources physicians draw on, what they consider sufficient for making statements about causes of death and when and on what grounds they consider autopsies needed. We broaden and generalise the question of how physicians report causes of death by viewing it as a case of knowledge-producing responsibility, the judgement about when knowledge is considered sufficient. By building this discussion on notions of expected and unexpected death, we also add to the sociological literature on categories of death.