Evidence-Based Analysis in Medico-Legal evaluation: A structure for Objective assessment

1.  Medical Negligence & Standard-of-Care assessment

• Evidence based Analysis is used to evaluate whether the physician’s treatment met or breached from established clinical guidelines which led to treatment failure.
• For instance, in osteoporosis diagnosis malpractice cases, not following the USPSTF screening guidelines (2025) can indicate medical negligence.

     2. Delayed Diagnosis & Improper treatment Cases

• Evidence-based medicine establishes if delayed diagnosis can lead to failure in prognosis.
• Example: Missed cancer screening → If EBA find that the earlier intervention could save the patient’s life, it confirms the malpractice.

     3. Pharmacovigilance & Adverse Drug Reactions

• Literature review of drug safety profile, Adverse drug reactions, FDA approvals, and randomized controlled trials help assess whether a physician followed best treatment practices in prescribing medicine or committing malpractice.
• Example: If a physician prescribed a higher risk drug with misdiagnosis and screening, Evidence based analysis can confirm a breach of standard-of-care.

     4. Medical Device Litigation

• Assessing RCTs and regulatory safety data reports (e.g., MHRA, FDA, EMA) ensures whether a medical device failure was due to fault in manufacturing or physician mistake.
• Case Example: Hip replacement failure led to patient illness—was the implant defective, or was the surgery done improperly?

     5.  Informed Consent disclosure & Patient Rights

• Informed consent disagreement depends on evidence-based analysis to determine whether patients received insufficient risk disclosures from available guidelines.
• Example: If the known surgical risk was not disclosed properly to the patient, EBA can establish whether the physician failed to instruct the patient sufficiently.