Related Experiment Videos
Manufactured Clinical Risk: Why Better Decisions Matter More Than Faster Investigations
Daniel Stewart1, Geoffrey Hardacre2
1Director of Emergency Medicine, Dubbo Health Service, Dubbo, Australia.
Emergency Medicine Australasia : EMA
|August 6, 2026
Summary
Manufactured Clinical Risk (MCR) is a cognitive bias where low-utility tests create perceived risk, leading to unnecessary emergency care. Addressing this bias can improve emergency department performance by reducing unneeded tests and treatments.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Science
- Healthcare Management
- Emergency Medicine
Background:
- Accurate emergency care requires judicious use of investigations and treatments.
- Recognizing when interventions are unnecessary is crucial for efficient patient care.
Purpose of the Study:
- Introduce Manufactured Clinical Risk (MCR), a cognitive phenomenon.
- Explain how MCR leads to unnecessary investigations and treatments in emergency care.
- Propose MCR as a framework to understand emergency department performance limitations.
Main Methods:
- Conceptual framework development.
- Analysis of cognitive biases in clinical decision-making.
- Literature review on emergency care pathways and performance metrics.
Main Results:
- MCR involves reinterpreting non-instrumental data from low-utility tests as genuine clinical risk.
- MCR stems from relief-based decision-making, prioritizing uncertainty reduction over probability assessment.
- MCR can trigger ambiguity cascades, increasing investigations, referrals, admissions, and treatments without improving diagnostic accuracy.
Conclusions:
- MCR offers a plausible explanation for why accelerating clinical activity doesn't always enhance emergency department performance.
- Improving threshold-based decision-making may reduce unnecessary clinical activity.
- Targeting cognitive biases like MCR could be a novel approach to enhance emergency care efficiency and effectiveness.
Related Concept Videos
01:23Types of Biopharmaceutical Studies: Controlled and Non-Controlled Approaches
Biopharmaceutical studies constitute a vital field aiming to enhance drug delivery methods and refine therapeutic approaches, drawing upon diverse interdisciplinary knowledge. In research methodologies, the choice between controlled and non-controlled studies significantly influences the study's reliability and accuracy.
Non-controlled studies, commonly employed for initial exploration, lack a control group, rendering them susceptible to biases and external influences. In contrast, controlled...
Non-controlled studies, commonly employed for initial exploration, lack a control group, rendering them susceptible to biases and external influences. In contrast, controlled...
01:11Clinical Trials: Overview
Clinical development focuses on how the drug will interact with the human body and encompasses four key phases of clinical trials, each serving a specific purpose in assessing the safety and effectiveness of new drugs. These phases overlap and build upon one another. Phase I involves a small group of healthy volunteers (typically 20-80 individuals) or, in cases where significant toxicity is expected, patients with the targeted disease, such as cancer or AIDS. The volunteers are tested for...
01:16Clinical Trials
Clinical trials are prospective experimental studies conducted on humans to determine the safety and efficacy of treatments, drugs, diet methods, and medical devices. Using statistics in clinical trials enables researchers to derive reasonable and accurate conclusions from the collected data, allowing them to make wise decisions in uncertain situations. In medical research, statistical methods are crucial for preventing errors and bias.
There are four phases in a clinical trial. A phase one...
There are four phases in a clinical trial. A phase one...
01:18Steps in Outbreak Investigation
In the ever-evolving field of public health, statistical analysis serves as a cornerstone for understanding and managing disease outbreaks. By leveraging various statistical tools, health professionals can predict potential outbreaks, analyze ongoing situations, and devise effective responses to mitigate impact. For that to happen, there are a few possible stages of the analysis:
01:23Investigation of Disease Outbreaks
Multistate foodborne outbreaks pose significant public health risks and require meticulous investigation to identify sources and implement control measures. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) utilizes a dynamic seven-step process for these investigations, integrating data from laboratories, interviews, and environmental assessments to protect public health.Outbreak Detection: The detection of multistate outbreaks typically begins with PulseNet, the CDC's national laboratory...
01:24Automated Microbial Diagnostics
Automated diagnostic analyzers have transformed clinical microbiology by providing rapid and reliable methods for pathogen identification and antibiotic susceptibility testing. Among these systems, the Vitek 2 is widely used because it automates the traditionally labor-intensive processes of microbial identification (ID) and antibiotic susceptibility testing (AST), delivering standardized and timely results that are essential for effective patient care.Microbial Identification with ID CardsThe...