The Clinical Case Report & Case Series Workbook
From consent and de-identification to a CARE-ready, submittable case report.
The problem it solves
Most clinicians meet a case worth reporting long before they know how to write one. Consent, de-identification, the CARE checklist, the timeline figure, the right journal — get any of them wrong and the work is desk-rejected before a reviewer reads it, or a patient is identifiable in print.
How it works
Patient confidentiality comes first, the way a journal treats it: the consent and de-identification chapters sit before you write a word, and the worked example models the standard it teaches throughout.
Who it is for
- Clinicians with a case worth reporting and no publication yet
- Trainees whose portfolio expects a publication
- Supervisors and senior authors who keep fixing the same problems in drafts
Who should look elsewhere. A case series of more than a handful of patients, or any design with a comparison group, is a different article type with different reporting standards. If you are synthesising published cases rather than reporting your own, you want the systematic review route instead.
What is inside
- Screening the case for worthiness, and naming a single teaching point
- Consent — obtained and documented to the standard a journal will accept
- De-identification, with the standard modelled rather than described
- Mapping to the CARE checklist before drafting, not after
- The timeline figure, which trainees get wrong more often than any other element
- Presentation and clinical findings
- Diagnostic assessment, including what was excluded and why
- Intervention and outcomes, with follow-up stated honestly
- A discussion that argues rather than summarises, and explicit teaching points
- A findable title and abstract
- Screening a journal — indexed, legitimate, appropriate — and assembling the submission
What you will have finished
- A case-worthiness decision and a single, sharp teaching point
- Documented consent and a de-identification standard a journal will accept
- Your case mapped to the CARE checklist before you draft
- A clean timeline figure — the element trainees most often get wrong
- Every section written: presentation, findings, assessment, intervention, outcomes
- A screened, indexed journal match and a complete submission package
What this adds to the free guidance
The CARE guideline is free and it is a checklist: it tells you a case report needs a timeline, not how to build one that a copy-editor will accept. And it says nothing about the two things that sink first case reports before review — consent that will not stand up, and de-identification that leaves a patient recognisable. Those chapters come first here, and the worked example throughout models the standard it teaches: relative timing, no identifiers, nothing that could expose a real person.
Built on CARE, ICMJE, COPE, DOAJ. Original tools that operationalise the published standards and point to the free official sources.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need written consent from the patient?
For a case report, effectively always. Most journals require documented consent from the patient or their legal representative regardless of how thoroughly the case is de-identified, and many will not consider a submission without it. Obtain it before you write, not after — the consent chapter comes before the drafting chapters for that reason.
How de-identified does it have to be?
Enough that the patient could not be recognised by someone who knows them — which is a higher bar than removing the name. Relative timing rather than dates, no unit or admission identifiers, and care with any combination of details that is individually innocuous and collectively unique. The book models this throughout.
Why do case reports get desk-rejected?
Most often for scope mismatch with the journal, a missing or inadequate consent statement, no clear teaching point, or non-compliance with CARE. All four are avoidable before submission, and all four are checked here.
Can I publish a case report as a trainee?
Yes, and it is the most common route to a first publication. What it requires is the discipline of the process rather than seniority — which is precisely what this workbook supplies.