A Clinical Forensic Medicine Study of Mechanical Injuries in Assault Cases

Medicolegal cases are imperative part of medical practice and is an important constituent of emergencies of tertiary care centers and the doctor on duty prepares medicolegal reports of such cases. The pattern of mechanical injuries due to assault differ between countries and communities due to their specific traditional , cultural and social factors prevalent in their areas. The major chunk of these medicolegal cases are of injuries caused as result of violence in this part of India.

The present study of 500 medicolegal cases of mechanical injuries of assault was conducted of those patients, who were admitted to Emergency department of Guru Nanak Dev Hospital attached to Government Medical College, Amritsar noting down their demographic details and injury details both clinically as well as radiologically.

In this study it was observed that majority of medicolegal cases were seen among males (89%) of age group of 21–40 years (61%). Majority of the cases belonged to rural background (77%) and most commonly involved occupational group was the labourers (35.4%) . Also, the majority of injuries were simple in nature(79.8%) and were predominantly inflicted by blunt weapon(67.6%) however the reverse trend was seen in injuries with grievous nature where the most common weapon was sharp edged weapon(55.1%) .

Since the assault related injury cases were higher among males, in young age group and in a rural population so for prevention of assault related activities, the main focus should be on encouraging the young age group, the concept of tolerance and rationalism.