Contemporary practice and ancient Case-taking compared: In this paper we wish to combine two perspectives: an historical and philological interpretation of the style and original creation of the Hippocratic Epidemics patient cases, and a comparison with current Western clinical practices with their own use of patient reports. Children patients serve as an excellent case study to this purpose: not only as they constitute a restricted category, which makes comparison with current medicine most conspicuous, but also because infant or children patients pose problems of intra-subjectivity and communication that are arguably analogous across different historical periods. This paper is the result of an interdisciplinary dialogue between two horizons: the scope of a practicing medical doctor experienced in ancient medicine (Graumann), and the approach to case taking in terms of cultural history and history of ancient medicine (Thumiger). Key questions are posed about the modality of case recording; its supposed didactic objectives; emotional and subjective aspects; the role played by authorial postures within the conventions of the genre. In conclusion, despite the historical and scientific gap between our two sets of sources medical case taking remains a core medical skill and a central feature of medical learning; the variations in the importance given to therapeutical aspects and subjective features help us illumine fundamental differences between ancient medicine and our own.