Life expectancy is an important issue in cases of serious personal injury. This book explains how to calculate life expectancy, and how to avoid common mistakes and misunderstandings. Basic concepts are illustrated with data from studies involving a wide range of conditions, including alcoholism, cerebral palsy, colon cancer, diabetes, and spinal cord injury (tetraplegia). There are also case studies of three of the major topics in life expectancy -- cerebral palsy; traumatic brain injury; and tetraplegia. The chapters are user-friendly, with extensive use of visual aids such as graphs and tables. The subject of epidemiology is at the heart of the methods that are discussed, and additional reading sources are suggested for those readers who would like to learn more about this important area of modern medicine.

This extensively revised second edition is a rigorous introduction to the construction and criticism of arguments about questions of fact, and to the marshalling and evaluation of evidence at all stages of litigation. It covers the principles underlying the logic of proof; the uses and dangers of story-telling; standards for decision and the relationship between probabilities and proof; the chart method and other methods of analyzing and ordering evidence in fact-investigation, in preparing for trial, and in connection with other important decisions in legal processes and in criminal investigation and intelligence analysis. Most of the chapters in this new edition have been rewritten; the treatment of fact investigation, probabilities and narrative has been extended; and new examples and exercises have been added. Designed as a flexible tool for undergraduate and postgraduate courses on evidence and proof, students, practitioners and teachers alike will find this book challenging but rewarding.