Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience· 2012Q1
Heuristic decision making in medicine
- 378citations
- Q1SCImago
- 2012year
Short summary
Simple decision strategies (heuristics) that ignore some information can lead to sound medical decisions for physicians and patients, sometimes outperforming complex statistical methods.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Key points
- Heuristics are simple decision strategies that intentionally ignore some information.
- Heuristics can outperform information-greedy methods like regressions in medical diagnosis.
- Features making heuristics useful in healthcare include accuracy, transparency, accessibility, low cost, and speed.
- Psychiatry is identified as a potential area for future research on heuristics in healthcare.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
Can less information be more helpful when it comes to making medical decisions? Contrary to the common intuition that more information is always better, the use of heuristics can help both physicians and patients to make sound decisions. Heuristics are simple decision strategies that ignore part of the available information, basing decisions on only a few relevant predictors. We discuss: (i) how doctors and patients use heuristics; and (ii) when heuristics outperform information-greedy methods, such as regressions in medical diagnosis. Furthermore, we outline those features of heuristics that make them useful in health care settings. These features include their surprising accuracy, transparency, and wide accessibility, as well as the low costs and little time required to employ them. We close by explaining one of the statistical reasons why heuristics are accurate, and by pointing to psychiatry as one area for future research on heuristics in health care.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience, 2012 · DOI ↗
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Field: Family Practice
Family PracticeMedicine