How doctors should think: Heuristic thinking isn ’t heretical

Doctors are intelligent people, but are we good thinkers? And how should we think? There are two basic kinds of thinking: analytic and intuitive. (And maybe good and bad, so that’s four.) Within medicine, analytic thinking can perhaps be best exemplified in the evidence-based movement, which began in the early 1990’s. It was a gilded age, full of promise, and bolstered by the reality that computers would give physicians instant access to the most thoroughly researched standards of care. Within our specialty of internal medicine, we watched the sacred texts of medical wisdom — Cecil, Harrison’s, and Scientific American — get leapfrogged by electronic medical resources like UpToDate. “A new paradigm for medical practice is emerging. Evidence-based medicine de-emphasizes intuition, unsystematic clinical experience, and pathophysiologic rationale as sufficient grounds for clinical decision making and stresses the examination of evidence from clinical research.” – Journal of the American Medical Association, 1992 The beauty and allure of the new paradigm — practicing evidence-based medicine — was its elegant simplicity: We’ll do what works, and we won’t do what doesn’t work. Continue reading ... Your patients are rating you online: How to respond. Manage your online reputation: A social media guide. Find out how.
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Conditions Primary Care Source Type: blogs