Clinical forensic medicine and its main fields of activity from the foundation of the German Society of Legal Medicine until today.
The fields mainly covered by clinical forensic medicine are subject to time-related changes which are described on the basis of the German literature of the 20th century. Some fields of forensic sexual medicine (diagnosis of virginity, proof of criminal abortion, potentia coeundi, potentia generandi, potentia concipiendi) have become less important in the daily work of medicolegal institutes, whereas victims of rape and sexual abuse continue to form a major part of the forensic examination material in the German-speaking countries. The evaluation of suspected physical child abuse has grown in importance since the 60s, and it is essentially the merit of Elisabeth Trube-Becker that this problem is now dealt with also in scientific medicine. More recently, medicolegal experts are increasingly confronted with further groups of persons: victims of domestic violence, abused/neglected seniors, refugees from countries where torture is used. A new special field, which established itself only in the 90s, is the estimation of age with regard to the criminal responsibility of suspects who have no identity papers or pretend to have none. A phenomenon frequently observed in the last two decades is the non-accidental self-infliction of injuries. Whereas in the first half of the 20th century the motive for self-mutilation was typically to evade military service, this category of injury was later mainly seen in the context of insurance fraud; more recently most forensically relevant self-inflicted injuries refer to simulated offenses (fictitious sexual offenses and robbery, attacks allegedly having a political background). One of the traditional fields of clinical forensic medicine continues to be the evaluation of victims and suspects following bodily harm and attempted homicides. In the field of civil law medicolegal experts are particularly often concerned with controversial consequences of traffic accidents (e.g. alleged whiplash injuries after rear-end collisions at low velocities).
Pollak
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Institute of Legal Medicine, University of Freiburg, Albertstrasse 9, Freiburg D-79104, Germany. legalmed@sun11.ukl.uni-freiburg.de
D000063:Accidents, Traffic; D000365:Age Determination by Skeleton; D000366:Age Determination by Teeth; D005060:Europe; D044707:Forensic Sciences / Q000266:history / Q000639:trends*; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D011599:Psychopathology; D016728:Self-Injurious Behavior / Q000523:psychology; D012742:Sex Offenses; D012955:Societies, Medical; D014754:Violence; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000473:pathology