Decision making

Question 1

Describe two ways of thinking?

Answer 1

1) System 1
- Quick and unconscious
- Uses heuristics
- Prone to error in ambiguous situations
2) System 2
- Takes more effort and mental ability
- Slower, conscious, deductive
- Rule-based
- More accurate

Question 2

What is a diagnostic error?

Answer 2

A missed, incorrect or delayed diagnosis.

Significant as can lead to preventable harm or death to the patient via delayed and inappropriate treatment.

Question 3

Methods of making decisions?

Answer 3

1) Hypothesis testing
- Arrive at a hypothesis. Test it by seeing if all other possibilities can be eliminated.
- Gold-standard
2) Pattern recognition
- Identifying patterns of symptoms to come to a diagnosis. Maybe for simpler cases than hypothesis testing.
3) Opinion testing or heuristic biases
- Coming to a conclusion with partial information by using heuristics.
- Least effective

Question 4

Problem with overconfidence in healthcare settings?

Answer 4

Overestimate how much you know and are unaware of what you don’t. Due to a failure to self-reflect and evaluate our own thought-processes, beliefs, values and behaviours.

Can increase the risk of preventable patient harm.