title: [The physician and the therapeutic decision].
abstract: 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.
authors.affiliation: Lehrstuhl für Medizintheorie und Komplementärmedizin Universität Witten/Herdecke. peter.matthiessen@uni-wh.de
authors.forename: Peter F
authors.initials: PF
authors.lastname: Matthiessen
mesh_terms: D015510:Clinical Medicine / Q000592:standards*; D003933:Diagnosis; D006801:Humans; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care