Free Essay on Factors Affecting
Clinical Decision-Making
First 2 Pages
Clinical
decision-making differs among the physicians according to their qualifications,
specialization and the relevant experience. Apart from these very basic factors
the decision by the physician also depends upon the willingness of the patient
in the provision of accurate information. The patient should not be hiding
anything from his physician. This piece deals with the very subject of the
clinical decision-making and attempts to identify the factors that are important
and that affect the clinical decision-making. The psychology of the patient also
influences the decision-making abilities of the concerned physician in that it
can create a limitation to the treatment pattern of the physician. When a
patient is limit and coward and does not want to undergo certain treatment that
involves operation of some kind then the physician is restricted. This is often
a hindrance to the decision-making and impacts it negatively.
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Foremost of all is the information at hand with the concerned physician. This is
of two types. The information already available with the physician in terms of
his qualifications and past experiences and also the information n he gets from
the mere observation and symptoms of the patient. The second kind of observation
relates to the past history of the patient in terms of what medicines and
illness he has been involved into in the past. This is the information that the
patient should be willing to provide honestly to their concerned physicians. The
value and impact of information for the physicians in decision-making cannot be
undermined in any case. Lets first be clear what does the words decision making
mean. It means the process of arriving at a decision regarding the diagnosis and
treatment plan of the patient. This decision-making is of most importance in the
health care sector and especially in connection with the information at hand
with the physicians (King, 1987; Marshall, 1992).
The Decision-Making Process
The decision-making process is a mutual one depending on the physician, patient,
patient’s family and cooperation, external as well as internal resources of
labs, colleagues, journals and libraries and many more. More information is
needed about the process of making a decision and the factors that affect the
decision, including the patient's cultural and/or ethnic group, the amount of
information that patients can comfortably absorb during this process, the
optimal amount of time needed to assimilate the information and make decisions,
the influence of the health professional's view of treatment options, the
patient's past history with illness, and the cost of the treatment. Research is
needed on what aspects of treatment should be emphasized and the optimal time
and ways to educate patients about the risks and benefits of treatment choices
(i.e., oral, written, graphic, video).
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