Role of clinical forensic medicine unit in quality and standardization of medico-legal reports

Babulal Chaudhary; Pawan Kumar Shukla; Binaya Kumar Bastia

doi:10.1016/j.jflm.2020.102007

Role of clinical forensic medicine unit in quality and standardization of medico-legal reports

J Forensic Leg Med. 2020 Aug:74:102007. doi: 10.1016/j.jflm.2020.102007. Epub 2020 Jul 2.

Authors

Babulal Chaudhary¹, Pawan Kumar Shukla², Binaya Kumar Bastia¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Forensic Medicine & Toxicology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, 249203, India.
² Department of Forensic Medicine & Toxicology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, 249203, India. Electronic address: pawan18shukla@gmail.com.

PMID: 32658770
DOI: 10.1016/j.jflm.2020.102007

Abstract

Introduction: Incomplete and inaccurate medico-legal report (MLR) often slow down the court trials and lead to incorrect judgments. Identification of such mistakes and shortcomings in the report can help in preventing litigations against doctors, unbiased court judgments, and injustice. Clinical Forensic Medicine Unit (CFMU) deals with all medico-legal cases (MLC) brought to the institution. It prepares MLR's, collect evidence, and supervises medicolegal issues of the institute.

Material & method: Pre-CFMU included 50 poisoning and 50 non-poisoning reports, selected randomly among 504 cases. Post-CFMU also included 50 poisoning and 50 non-poisoning reports, which were chosen randomly among total 588 cases.

Result: Comparing the pre and post CFMU non-poisoning reports, the following parameters were statistically significant; date and time of examination, address of the patient, details of accompanied police, details of attendant, identification marks, history of incidence, consent, description, dimension, location and age of injuries, pictorial presentation, general condition of the patient on arrival, and final opinion. Comparing the pre and post CFMU poisoning reports, statistically significant results were obtained for the following parameters; address of the patient, identification marks, history of incidence, consent, general condition of the patient on arrival, details of evidence collected, preservative used, seal status, and final opinion.

Conclusion: The present study concludes that the errors were significantly reduced in medico-legal reports prepared by forensic experts. It is, therefore, necessary to employ forensic experts at every healthcare facility not only to prevent lawsuits but also to strengthen the judiciary. Additionally, we recommend regular training of non-forensic professionals to acquaint them with medico-legal work.

Keywords: Clinical forensic medicine unit; Forensic specialist; Injury cases; Medico-legal cases; Medico-legal reports; Poisoning cases.

Publication types

Observational Study

MeSH terms

Documentation / standards*
Forensic Medicine / standards*
Humans
India
Medical Records / standards*
Poisoning
Quality Control
Retrospective Studies