[The physician and the therapeutic decision].
Science in medicine is never a self-fulfilling goal but always serves the purpose to provide the best medical care in a unique clinical situation. Coming to a rational therapeutic decision requires a diagnosis in the sense of allowing and legitimizing an action-oriented individual statement. The diagnosis, however, cannot be reduced to a process of abstraction and formalization, but it rather consists of the ability to allocate general designations of illness to an individual patient. This requires a person-oriented, not necessarily strictly formal knowledge. Inasmuch as guidelines should not become imperative instructions, the individual medical judgment should remain an indispensable focus of the identity of the medical profession.
Matthiessen
Peter F
PF
Lehrstuhl für Medizintheorie und Komplementärmedizin Universität Witten/Herdecke. peter.matthiessen@uni-wh.de
D015510:Clinical Medicine / Q000592:standards*; D003933:Diagnosis; D006801:Humans; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care