ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an understanding on the contributions that case reports make to medical communication and argumentation. Historically, clinical case reports are among the oldest ways of communicating lived clinical experience. There are three different types of clinical case reports used in medical communication: case reports, clinical vignettes, and case series reports. Even oral presentations of clinical cases should incorporate the most relevant elements of written clinical case reporting format. The rarity of cases implies that epidemiological considerations of causality are only one approach. Another approach must be other considerations which derive causality from single or few observations, which are subject to different and often complementary criteria of causes and considerations of consequences. Establishing a cause-effect relationship based on evidence from only a few cases is appropriate in clinical pharmacology in specific cases where required conditions are met and related to adverse drug reactions.
