Flourishing in Medicine: From Surviving to Thriving Episode 17 From Psychology to Emergency Medicine: Dr. Pat Croskerry on Cognitive Bias and Diagnostic Safety

The guest today is Pat Croskerry, MD, PhD, is a professor in emergency medicine at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Trained as an experimental psychologist, Dr. Croskerry went on to become an emergency medicine physician and found himself surprised by the relatively scant amount of attention given to cognitive errors. He has become one of the world's foremost experts in safety in emergency medicine and diagnostic errors. Dr. Croskerry is currently Director of the Critical Thinking Program within the Division of Medical Education, Dalhousie University. His interests lie primarily in clinical decision making, diagnostic failure, and the role of cognitive and affective bias in decision making. Recent work is aimed at cognitive bias mitigation.During this fascinating conversation, Pat shares his unique path to medicine, stemming from a background in psychology that instilled a focus on critical thinking and cognitive biases, and the discipline to study medicine, informed by his brief rowing career during which, as a member of the Canadian National Team he competed in the Olympic Games. He delves into specific biases affecting medical decision-making, such as emotional affective, anchoring, and search satisficing biases, stressing the need to mitigate these biases for accurate diagnoses. Furthermore, he explores the impact of cognitive load and decision fatigue on physician well-being, advocating for a reconsideration of critical thinking's role in modern medical practice to ensure optimal performance and professional satisfaction.Guest: Pat Croskerry, MD, PhD, FRCPLinkedIn Page: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pat-croskerry-199a8132/Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_CroskerryNEJM Interview: https://www.nejm.org/action/showMediaPlayer?doi=10.1056%2FNEJMdo002218&aid=10.1056%2FNEJMp1303712&area=Other references:Croskerry P, Clancy M. Advancing diagnostic excellence: the cognitive challenge for medicine. BMJ. 2022 Mar 29;376:o799. doi: 10.1136/bmj.o799. PMID: 35351777.Olson A, Rencic J, Cosby K, Rusz D, Papa F, Croskerry P, Zierler B, Harkless G, Giuliano MA, Schoenbaum S, Colford C, Cahill M, Gerstner L, Grice GR, Graber ML. Competencies for improving diagnosis: an interprofessional framework for education and training in health care. Diagnosis (Berl). 2019 Nov 26;6(4):335-341. doi: 10.1515/dx-2018-0107. PMID: 31271549.Croskerry P. From mindless to mindful practice--cognitive bias and clinical decision making. N Engl J Med. 2013 Jun 27;368(26):2445-8. doi: 10.1056/NEJMp1303712. PMID: 23802513.