Clinical Judgement in the Health and Welfare Professions: Extending the Evidence Base

In the last decade, the problem of clinical judgment has been reduced to the simple question: what works? However, before clinicians can begin to think about what works, they must first address more fundamental questions such as: what's wrong? or what sort of problem is this? The complex ways in which professionals negotiate the process of case formulation remain radically under-explored in the existing literature. This timely book examines this neglected area. Drawing on the authors' own detailed ethnographic and discourse analytic studies and on developments in social science, the book aims to reconstitute clinical judgment and case formulation as both practical-moral and rational-technical activities. By making social scientific work more accessible and meaningful to professionals in practice, it develops the case for a more realistic approach to the many reasoning processes involved in clinical judgment. Clinical Judgment in the Health and Welfare Professions has been written for educators, managers, practitioners and advanced students in health and social care. It will also appeal to those with an interest in the analysis of institutional discourse and ethnographic research.