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.

Keywords: Exemplars; Experiential knowledge; Heuristics; Illness script; Intuition.