Clinical judgment in rheumatoid arthritis. II. Judging 'current disease activity' in clinical practice

Two rheumatologists made judgments about 'current disease activity' in real patients and 'paper patients' with rheumatoid arthritis. Analysis of each set of judgments provides a model of judgment policy which contains only 3 clinical variables but explains over 94% of the variance in judgments. The judgment policy models differ markedly from each other and from the clinicians' own perceptions of their behaviour. Judgment policy modelling offers a means of improving co-ordination between clinical investigators within and between centres.