[Forensic risk in emergency medicine]

Activities in the emergency departments increase in all countries for many reasons: medical, social, economic, etc. In the same time, it is logical to observe an increase in claims; this is confirmed by the insurance companies. In this review, we describe the typology of claims according to the Reason model, also named Swiss cheese model. Thus weseparate the risk situations, the taking risk and the lack of information. When the three factors are associated, claims occur. Then it is easy to propose a method of prevention based on the compliance to the recommandations of good pratices written by the scientific societies.