Unravelling the process of therapeutic reasoning
Period 2021 – 2025
How do doctors choose the right therapy for a patient? Prescribing medicines is a complex process, which depends on many factors. Because of this complexity, medication errors are made regularly which can cause preventable harm to patients. To improve the prescribing skills, it is necessary to understand more about the therapeutic reasoning process, because it is still not clear how prescribers choose the right medicine. Some theories about (pharmaco)therapeutic reasoning have been made, but mostly based on diagnostic reasoning, although there are important differences between those. Next to that, not only doctors prescribe regularly, but also dentists, physician assistants, obstetricians and advanced nurse practitioners. Is their therapeutic reasoning process comparable or do we need other education strategies? And what are the differences in this reasoning process between experienced and unexperienced prescribers? The aim of this thesis is to get more insight in the process of (pharmaco)therapeutic reasoning and to give recommendations on how to improve this reasoning process based on the findings.
PhD-student: Mariëlle Hartjes, m.hartjes@amsterdamumc.nl
Promotor: Prof. dr. M.A. van Agtmael
Co-promotors: Dr. J. Tichelaar & Dr. M.C. Richir
How do doctors choose the right therapy for a patient? Prescribing medicines is a complex process, which depends on many factors. Because of this complexity, medication errors are made regularly which can cause preventable harm to patients. To improve the prescribing skills, it is necessary to understand more about the therapeutic reasoning process, because it is still not clear how prescribers choose the right medicine. Some theories about (pharmaco)therapeutic reasoning have been made, but mostly based on diagnostic reasoning, although there are important differences between those. Next to that, not only doctors prescribe regularly, but also dentists, physician assistants, obstetricians and advanced nurse practitioners. Is their therapeutic reasoning process comparable or do we need other education strategies? And what are the differences in this reasoning process between experienced and unexperienced prescribers? The aim of this thesis is to get more insight in the process of (pharmaco)therapeutic reasoning and to give recommendations on how to improve this reasoning process based on the findings.
PhD-student: Mariëlle Hartjes, m.hartjes@amsterdamumc.nl
Promotor: Prof. dr. M.A. van Agtmael
Co-promotors: Dr. J. Tichelaar & Dr. M.C. Richir