Methodological Bias That Can Reduce (or Affect) the Process of Diagnostic Construction in Clinical Settings

Frontiers in Psychology

article

Antonio Iudici¹  Elena Faccio¹  Gianluca Castelnuovo²  Gian Piero Turchi¹ 

[1] Department of Philosophy, University of Padova;Psychology Research Laboratory, Istituto Auxologico Italiano (IRCCS)

关键词: bias (B);    diagnosis;    evaluation;    clinical;    assessment;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00157

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

The diagnostic process is a fundamental element of practice in the clinical and healthcare fieldsin particular, both for its repercussions on patient healing and care and for the professionalismwith which healthcare professionals carry out their roles. Deriving from the Greek dia-gnosis(knowing through), the diagnostic process is the cognitive process implemented by a healthcareprofessional in his or her work. Although “diagnosis,” at the level of common sense, is morewidely used as a noun, it should be noted that the diagnostic process recalls the path ofdiscovery implemented by professionals in reference to their categories of observation, leadingto a definition of their work object. As part of an operation on the cardiovascular system, asurgeon will mainly work on the biochemical implications of that body part, while a physicianstruggling with the decision to conduct a plastic surgery on the face could have as an object notonly the face but also the story of the person requesting the intervention. On closer inspection,the physician’s observational and professional skills interact with the patient’s communicativeskills, and this exchange may occur according to different interactive modalities (compliance).Indeed, information on some medical history could only emerge with by creating the favorablerelational conditions (Kripalani et al., 2007; Sanders, 2009; Castelnuovo, 2013). Furthermore, thisinteractive dynamism is influenced by the context in which it occurs and by the objectives ofthe healthcare structure. Far from being a mechanistic action, the diagnostic process entails abroad and varied complexity, which requires a suitable management capacity (decision making).Research in the healthcare field has found that 44% of the general errors made by healthcarepersonnel concern the diagnostic process (Shiff et al., 2009). One-third of these errors, assome studies claim, has a cognitive nature (Pepe et al., 2012), and the greatest difficultiesconcern the processing of the contents found (Turchi and Perno, 2004; Croskerry, 2008).This demonstrates the need to increasingly refine the reasoning at the base of the diagnosticprocess.

【 授权许可】

CC BY