Introduction: In addition to providing first aid, primary treating doctors are required to describe and register injuries acquired in accidents and assaults. They should do this with the highest possible accuracy, as this official document is often the only documentary evidence of soft tissue injuries in case a lawsuit is filed later. Characteristics of injuries may disappear faster with the healing process of the soft tissue, making it impossible for forensic experts to deduce the weapon involved. Consequently, terminological accuracy is a prerequisite for the appropriate reconstruction of the type and severity of injuries. This study aims at analysing reports on soft tissue injuries in Hungary and Austria from the terminological point of view. It is meant to reveal inaccuracies in the use of noun phrases impairing objective and accurate forensic assessment.
Material and method: A corpus-based analysis was conducted on 200 Medical Diagnostic Reports (MDRs) from Hungary and Austria (100 from each country) with the linguistic software WordSmith 5.0. Results were processed in Microsoft Excel and demonstrated in graphs.
Results: The analysis showed that terminology describing soft tissue injuries is not consistent. Comparatively few characteristics of injuries were recorded in both sub-corpuses. Due to inconsistent use of terms and missing characteristics, 17 % of the Hungarian and 18% of the Austrian MDRs were not completely assessable by forensic experts.
Conclusions: Describing injuries for legal purposes needs standardisation.
