title: How Expert Clinicians Intuitively Recognize a Medical Diagnosis.
abstract: Research has shown that expert clinicians make a medical diagnosis through a process of hypothesis generation and verification. Experts begin the diagnostic process by generating a list of diagnostic hypotheses using intuitive, nonanalytic reasoning. Analytic reasoning then allows the clinician to test and verify or reject each hypothesis, leading to a diagnostic conclusion. In this article, we focus on the initial step of hypothesis generation and review how expert clinicians use experiential knowledge to intuitively recognize a medical diagnosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Eastern Virginia Medical School and Sentara Healthcare, Norfolk, Va. Electronic address: jebrush@me.com.
authors.forename: John E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Brush
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: Jonathan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sherbino
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: Geoffrey R
authors.initials: GR
authors.lastname: Norman
mesh_terms: D002983:Clinical Competence; D000066491:Clinical Decision-Making; D000066506:Heuristics; D006801:Humans; D019545:Intuition
keywords: Exemplars; Experiential knowledge; Heuristics; Illness script; Intuition