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Writing Case Reports and Review Articles
Case Reports
This section covers the basics of writing a case report:
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Purpose
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General considerations
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Introduction section
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Case description section
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Discussion section
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Abstract
An annotated case report that illustrates many of the concepts discussed here is included at the end of the chapter.
Edward J. Huth covers the topic of case reports in greater detail in his excellent book How to Write and Publish Papers in the Medical Sciences (Baltimore, Williams & Wilkins, 1990).
Purpose
The purpose of a case report is to describe a unique or extremely unusual patient case that has educational value to other physicians . Most commonly, case reports are written for 1 of 4 reasons:
▪ To report a previously undescribed disease or syndrome;
▪ To report the unexpected association of 2 or more diseases, disorders, or symptoms, especially if a common cause is likely; ▪ To report a new and clinically relevant variation in a disease or syndrome (for example, the occurrence in an adult of a disease previously seen only in children; disease in a human caused by a pathogen previously believed to cause disease only in animals); or
Writing and Publishing Scientific Articles Research Medical Library
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