TY - JOUR
T1 - Strategic Maneuvering in Treatment Decision-Making Discussions
T2 - Two Cases in Point
AU - Labrie, Nanon
PY - 2012/5/1
Y1 - 2012/5/1
N2 - Over the past decade, the ideal model of shared decision-making has been increasingly promoted as the preferred standard of doctor-patient communication in medical consultation. The model advocates a treatment decision-making process in which the doctor and his patient are considered coequal partners that carefully negotiate the treatment options available in order to ultimately reach a treatment decision that is mutually shared. Thereby, the model notably leaves room for-and stimulates-argumentative discussions to arise in the context of medical consultation. A paradigm example of a discussion that often emerges between doctors and their patients concerns antibiotics as a method of treatment for what is presumed to be a viral infection. Whereas the doctor will generally not encourage treatment with antibiotics, patients oftentimes prefer the medicine to other methods of treatment. In this paper, two cases of such antibiotic-related discussions in consultation are studied using insights gained in the extended pragma-dialectical theory to argumentation. It is examined how patient and physician maneuver strategically in order to maintain a balance between dialectical reasonableness and rhetorical effectiveness, as well as an equilibrium between patient participation and evidence-based medication, while arguing a case for and against antibiotics respectively.
AB - Over the past decade, the ideal model of shared decision-making has been increasingly promoted as the preferred standard of doctor-patient communication in medical consultation. The model advocates a treatment decision-making process in which the doctor and his patient are considered coequal partners that carefully negotiate the treatment options available in order to ultimately reach a treatment decision that is mutually shared. Thereby, the model notably leaves room for-and stimulates-argumentative discussions to arise in the context of medical consultation. A paradigm example of a discussion that often emerges between doctors and their patients concerns antibiotics as a method of treatment for what is presumed to be a viral infection. Whereas the doctor will generally not encourage treatment with antibiotics, patients oftentimes prefer the medicine to other methods of treatment. In this paper, two cases of such antibiotic-related discussions in consultation are studied using insights gained in the extended pragma-dialectical theory to argumentation. It is examined how patient and physician maneuver strategically in order to maintain a balance between dialectical reasonableness and rhetorical effectiveness, as well as an equilibrium between patient participation and evidence-based medication, while arguing a case for and against antibiotics respectively.
KW - Antibiotics
KW - Doctor-patient consultation
KW - Pragma-dialectics
KW - Shared decision-making
KW - Strategic maneuvering
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U2 - 10.1007/s10503-011-9228-5
DO - 10.1007/s10503-011-9228-5
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84859832739
SN - 0920-427X
VL - 26
SP - 171
EP - 199
JO - Argumentation
JF - Argumentation
IS - 2
ER -