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Concept
Case report
Summary
In medicine, a case report is a detailed report of the symptoms, signs, diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up of an individual patient. Case reports may contain a of the patient, but usually describe an unusual or novel occurrence. Some case reports also contain a literature review of other reported cases. Case reports are professional narratives that provide feedback on clinical practice guidelines and offer a framework for early signals of effectiveness, adverse events, and cost. They can be shared for medical, scientific, or educational purposes.
Most case reports are on one of six topics:
An unexpected association between diseases or symptoms.
An unexpected event in the course of observing or treating a patient.
Findings that shed new light on the possible pathogenesis of a disease or an adverse effect.
Unique or rare features of a disease.
Unique therapeutic approaches.
A positional or quantitative variation of the anatomical structures.
A case report is generally considered a type of anecdotal evidence. Given their intrinsic methodological limitations, including lack of statistical sampling, case reports are placed at the bottom of the hierarchy of clinical evidence, together with case series. Nevertheless, case reports do have genuinely useful roles in medical research and evidence-based medicine. In particular, they have facilitated recognition of new diseases and adverse effects of treatments (e.g., recognition of the link between administration of thalidomide to mothers and malformations in their babies was triggered by a case report). Case reports have a role in pharmacovigilance. They can also help understand the clinical spectrum of rare diseases as well as unusual presentations of common diseases. They can help generate study hypotheses, including plausible mechanisms of disease. Case reports may also have a role to play in guiding the personalization of treatments in clinical practice.
Proponents of case reports have outlined some particular advantages of the format.
Official source
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