Traité d’expertise Médico-Légale

P Forcier et M Lacerte, ed. Editions Yvon Blais Publ., 2006, Cowansville ISBN 2-894451-976-1

This book published in 2006 in French does not age and should remain a bedside book for any good expert who can read French. This book was published shortly after Dr. Forcier left us forever, bequeathing us his latest book, his favorite, his will to some extent, the result of over 15 years of discussions and exchanges on medical expertise with his friend Dr. Michel Lacerte. In this new book, Dr. Forcier and Dr. Lacerte did a tour de force by clearly outlining in Chapters 1, 3 and 4, the duties of the claimant, the requesting party and the experts. Chapter 2, devoted to the use of adjectives in a forensic medicine, stressing the sake of accuracy in any medico-legal report. Chapter 4, describes the qualities the expert should have: courage, independence, impartiality, and relative solitude in the construct of a well-reasoned opinion. In Chapter 5, the causal medical relationship is discussed in detail (114 pages); often the neophyte expert, will say: this sis common sense; common sense is not enough in this area, and the causal analysis shall be rigorous revisiting all the imputation criteria. Finally in Chapter 6, before concluding, the authors comment some classical medico-legal errors. I can only agree with their conclusions when the authors mention that “the science of expertise is not improvisation: it has to be learnt and experienced,” citing Professor. B Proust, professor of Forensic Medicine in Rouen. This quote should be placed as an epigraph to this book to encourage medical experts to devote the same energy to improve their medico-legal knowledge they have spent in the past years to acquire and maintain their level of knowledge in their own specialty. It has often been asked, during our years of University training in medical expertise, why a book was not written to complete the master lectures: this book responds to this request. With Dr. Forcier and Dr. Lacerte, we believe that the only way to improve the quality of medico-legal reports is to learn how to write a thorough well motivated forensic report. This work will prove to be most useful to help improve forensic expertise in Francophone countries.