- What counts as a risk?
Queensland’s Act gives the clearest definition. Under it, remains “pose a cremation risk” when something inside them could, once in the cremator, put a person at risk of death, injury or illness. Its examples are “a cardiac pacemaker or radioactive implant”.
NSW Health’s cremation risk advice form lists what a doctor is asked about:
- a cardiac pacemaker, a defibrillator, or any implanted or attached battery-operated medical device
- a permanent radioactive implant
- treatment with therapeutic radioactive injections within 12 months before death.
- Who is asked about it?
Each state puts the question to someone different. The table shows what each state’s own form or law says.
| State | What is asked | Of whom |
|---|---|---|
| New South Wales | Was a battery-powered device present? Has it been removed? Where it is still in place, the applicant is asked to consent (or not) to an “appropriately qualified person” taking it out. “Not aware” is an allowed answer. A separate question covers radioactive treatment in the past 12 months. | The applicant for the cremation, in a statutory declaration. A doctor who treated the person, or knows their history, may also give the crematorium written risk advice. |
| Victoria | One of three statements: no pacemaker or battery-powered device; removal has been arranged; or it has not been removed because the cemetery trust does not require it. | The funeral director or the person arranging the cremation signs the statement; where a device is present, one option is to confirm they have arranged its removal. A family arranging a cremation itself in Victoria is the person arranging it, so arranging the removal falls to them. |
| Queensland | Whether the remains pose a cremation risk. Permission to cremate can be given only if the doctor is reasonably satisfied they do not. | A cremation risk certificate signed by the doctor who signed the cause of death certificate, or another doctor if they are unavailable; then the doctor who issues permission, who must not have signed either certificate. |
| Western Australia | “Pacemaker removed? Yes / N/A” on the cremation application. | The Metropolitan Cemeteries Board’s form puts removal of pacemakers and other devices that could explode on the funeral director, before the cremation. For a family using a Single Funeral Permit, the package’s step for getting the permit to cremate tells them to ask whether there is a pacemaker and, if so, whether it has been removed. |
- Does the family have to arrange the removal?
On the forms above, the family’s part is to answer the question and, in New South Wales, to give permission. Western Australia’s form places the removal with the funeral director; Victoria’s with the funeral director or the person arranging the cremation; and the NSW form asks the applicant for permission for an appropriately qualified person to do it. Where a family arranges a cremation without a funeral director, the question comes to them directly, which is why the WA package spells it out.
- What if nobody knows?
That happens, and the forms allow for it. The NSW application accepts “Not aware” as an answer. NSW Health’s risk advice exists so that a doctor who attended the person before or during their final illness, or who knows their medical history, can tell the crematorium about implants and recent treatments.
- What about hip joints, plates and screws?
The Metropolitan Cemeteries Board in Perth explains that surgical metal, such as artificial joints, plates and screws, mostly survives the heat and is left in the cremation chamber afterwards.
At the Board’s crematoria these metals are recycled unless the family says otherwise before the cremation, and the money raised goes to Western Australian charities. A family can opt out, or ask for an item to be returned with the ashes, by telling the funeral director beforehand. That is the Board’s practice in Perth; elsewhere, the crematorium being used can say what it does.
- And jewellery?
The same Board explains that a cremation chamber runs at around 800°C to 1,000°C, hot enough to melt or vaporise gold and silver and to damage or destroy gemstones, so jewellery cannot be recovered afterwards. Its advice is to take off anything the family wants to keep beforehand and tell the funeral director.