Case Report

and
Case Series
By,
Akash Aravind.M.N
M.Pharm Pharmacy Practice
P1118005
 Case Report

Definition:
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 demographic profile of the patient, but
usually describe an unusual or novel occurrence. Some case reports
also contain a literature review of other reported cases.
 Reasons
• Usually rare disease.
• Association of diseases.
• Rare presentation of more common diseases.
• Detection of adverse or beneficial side effects of drugs and other
treatments.
• Reporting a particular outcome of a case management.
• Mistakes, complications and lessons learned.
 Structure of a case report
• Title
• Abstract
• Introduction
• Description
• Discussion
• Conclusion
• References
• Title: Should be brief and informative.
• Abstract: Short summary that gives an overall idea about the content
of the case report. Quite brief and generally shorter than that for
other types of articles, has word limit of 100 words or less.
• Introduction: Should be concise and immediately attract the
attention and interest of the reader. Provide background information
why the case is worth reading and publishing and provides an
explanation of the focus of the case report.
Description:
• The current medical condition and medical history, including relevant family
history.
• It should be described in chronological order.
History
 Presenting features
 Past medical history
 Social and family history
 Drug history
• Physical examination
• Investigations
• Differential diagnosis
• Treatment
• Outcome
• Patient confidentiality must be preserved.
• Patient demographic such as age and gender, and occasionally, race
and occupation are referred to in the first sentence.
• In order to reduce the possibility of identifying the patient, the
patient’s initials, date of birth, and other identifies such as hospital
number must not be used.
• Discussion: Most important section of the case report. It summarize
and interpret the key findings of the case report, to contrast the case
report with what is already known in the literature.
 Advantages
• Can help in the identification of new trends or diseases.
• Can help detect new drug side effects and potential uses (adverse or
beneficial)
• Educational-a way sharing lessons learned.
• Identifies rare manifestations of a disease.
• Case studies exposure the participants to real life situations which
otherwise is difficult.
 Disadvantages
• Cases may not be generalizable.
• Not based on systematic studies.
• Causes or association may have other explanations.
• Can be seen as emphasizing the bizarre or focusing on misleading
elements.
• Involves selection bias.
• It has not any control arm.
 Case Series
Definition
• Experience of a group with a similar diagnosis.
• Assesses prevalent disease.
• Cases may be identified from a single or multiple sources.
• Generally report on new/unique condition.
• A realistic design for rare disorders.
• Variation on theme of the solitary case report.
• Retrospective look at series of cases that have features in common.
• Common diagnosis, treatment, measures.
• Each case maybe separately described, or the cases may be lumped
together with data summaries.
Advantages
• Useful for hypothesis generation.
• Informative for very rare disease with few established risk factors.
• Characterizes averages for disorder.

Disadvantages
• Cannot study cause and effect relationships.
• Cannot assess disease frequently.
Thank you