Please click here to log in with you RCPsych web account details; you will be redirected back to CPD Online.If you have forgotten your College web account details, you will be able to reset them here.
Please click here to log in if your institution has a subscription to CPD Online with Athens access.
Please click here to log in if you are subscribed through Medicom Netherlands.
If you having troubles signing in with the options above, please try this alternative login route.
by Dr Derek K. Tracy and Professor Keith J.B. Rix
Last reviewed: June 2020
Although malingering of mental disorder may be encountered only occasionally in clinical practice, it calls for particular consideration in the medico-legal setting. If successful, claimants in personal injury litigation may be compensated for injuries they have not suffered or receive more compensation than they are entitled to. Malingering can also lead to criminal offenders avoiding conviction.
There are certain psychometric tests that can assist with the detection of malingering, but their use by those unfamiliar with their scientific basis or insufficiently trained can cause difficulties for the expert witness who relies on them in court. Even more so if the expert trespasses into the judge's territory by offering an opinion on the credibility of a litigant.
Completion of this module will enable you to feel better prepared when offering expert evidence regarding the genuineness of a litigant's history or presentation.
Start the module
A guide to medico-legal report writing in asylum cases by Dr Hugh Grant-Peterkin and Dr Alexandra Joy
Podcast Malingering with Dr Gerald Rosen
Or why not try a Quickbite module?:
Use of mental health legislation in eating disorders by E. Jane B. Morris
Related Advances articles
Download take-home notes to print and annotate