Case Report

Contents:
Case Report
 Definition
 Importance of case report study
 Pyramid of evidence
Examples:
 Real life example
 Fictitious example
Advantages
Disadvantages
Summary

Definition:
In medicine, a case report is a detailed
report of the symptoms, signs, diagnosis,
treatment, and follow-up of an individual
patient.

Cont….
Case reports often describe:
Unique cases that cannot be explained by known
diseases or syndromes.
Cases that show an important variation of a disease or
condition.
Cases that show unexpected events that may yield new
or useful information.
Cases in which one patient has two or more unexpected
diseases or disorders.

Importance:
Case reports are considered the lowest level of
evidence, but they are also the first line of evidence,
because they are, where new issues and ideas
emerge.
They basically form the base of evidences pyramid.

A good case report will be clear about the importance
of the observation being reported.
If multiple case reports show something similar, the
next step might be a case-control study to determine
if there is a relationship between the relevant
variables.

Case Report Example:
Cystic Meningioma

Identification:
 A 57 years old female presented at the neurosurgical
outpatient clinics .
 Noted left hemiparesis and numbness of left upper
extremity .
Recurrent episodes of headaches during the past 2
months, occurring mainly in the morning.

Physical Examination:
Alert, full of consciousness patient, orientated in time and
place
 Left spastic hemiparesis
 Left Babinski sign
 Impaired light touch and pin prick sensation in left upper
and lower extremity accompanied with dysesthesia
 A head MRI scan was ordered

CASE:2
 A physician treated a young and otherwise healthy
patient who came to her office reporting numbness
all over her body. The physician could not determine
any reason for this numbness and had never seen
anything like it.

Examination:
 After taking an extensive history the physician
discovered that the patient had recently been to the
beach for a vacation and had used a very new type
of spray sunscreen. The patient had stored the
sunscreen in her cooler at the beach because she
liked the feel of the cool spray in the hot sun.

Diagnose:
 The physician suspected that the spray sunscreen
had undergone a chemical reaction from the
coldness which caused the numbness. She also
suspected that because this is a new type of
sunscreen other physicians may soon be seeing
patients with this numbness.

Conclusion:
 The physician wrote up a case report describing how
the numbness presented,
 How and why she concluded it was the spray
sunscreen, and how she treated the patient?
 Later, when other doctors began seeing patients with
this numbness,
 They found this case report helpful as a starting
point in treating their patients

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 of sharing lessons
learned.
Identifies rare manifestations of a
disease.

 Cases may not be generalizable.
 Not based on systematic studies.
 Causes or associations may have
other explanations.
 Can be seen as emphasizing the
bizarre or focusing on misleading
elements.

Case report is “An article that describes and
interprets an individual case, often written in the
form of a detailed story.”
Case report are considered to be the first line of
evidence.
 It represents a relevant, timely, and important
study design in advancing medical scientific
knowledge especially of rare diseases.

Refrences:The “Himmelfarb Health
sciences Library.”
BMJ Case reports.com
Information Vines
Google.com

Case Report

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Case Report