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J R Soc Med 2003;96:497-498
doi:10.1258/jrsm.96.10.497
© 2003 Royal Society of Medicine

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J R Soc Med 2003;96:497-498
© 2003 The Royal Society of Medicine

The accuracy of guestimates

Iain McLean MPhil   C Mary Anderson BM BCh  1   Cath White MB ChB  1

Academic Unit of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of Manchester
1 St Mary's Sexual Assault Referral Centre, St Mary's Hospital, Manchester, UK

Correspondence to: Iain McLean, Research Assistant, St Mary's Sexual Assault Referral Centre, St Mary's Hospital, Whitworth Park, Manchester M13 0JH, UK

At times a clinician must describe the size of a lesion when measurement presents difficulties. A ‘guestimate’ may then be recorded. We tested the accuracy of forensic clinicians (10 physicians and 1 nurse) in guestimating the sizes of ten test objects, comparing their performance with 13 individuals from other professions. The participants were permitted to handle the objects but not to use a measuring device.

For three of the objects (a balloon, a scratch and a coin) the entire sample of participants significantly overestimated size, by 13-22%. Both participant groups overestimated the size of a scratch, the clinicians being more accurate but not significantly so.

Guestimates should be avoided unless the use of a ruler or tape measure will be against the interests of the client.


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