Behavioral Economics In the Medical Field

Abstract

How can biases in decision-making affect the advice that physicians give to their patients and professional colleagues? Physicians make difficult decisions and work under pressure, but the addition of heuristics influences their thinking and greatly impacts their patients. Heuristics are subconscious biases that are triggered by the brain to arrive at a rapid decision when posed with a problem. There are three that have a significant influence in the medical field. Firstly, framing affects how individuals make decisions based on how data is presented, and how they present this information. Representativeness modifies how one estimates/judges the probabilities of an event under uncertainty. Lastly, the availability heuristic is triggered when making judgments of the likelihood that an event will occur based on past examples coming to mind. The potential for logical and reasonable solutions is also taken into consideration as ideally solutions would be implemented throughout health care.