A qualitative, descriptive study that focuses on an individual patient (a case series includes multiple individuals) and a particular condition, procedure, association or other phenomenon that is unusual and interesting enough to be written up on its own. Case studies in and of themselves cannot show causation, establish a trend, generalize to other individuals, inform incidence or prevalence or otherwise “prove” anything. They are used to generate hypotheses, raise awareness of a potential issue, provide instruction on a procedure, seek a mechanism for a suspected cause-and-effect relationship, or similar purposes.
