What is differential diagnosis?
In medicine, a differential diagnosis is a diagnosis that examines all possible causes of a set of symptoms to achieve a diagnosis. For example, if a patient represents a cold, doctors may consider causes such as hay fever and colds in differential diagnosis in an effort to reach proper diagnosis. Many doctors use this system of diagnostics in their practices and some doctors known as diagnostics really specialize in it. Interviews with the patient to collect symptoms, and also collect the family, personal and social history that provides a picture of the patient's background. Tests and tests are also usually included to obtain specific information about the patient's current condition. In a particularly mysterious case, the doctor can talk to friends and collaborators or explore the patient's natural environment to seek causes.
As soon as the physician collects all evidence, he considers the possible causes of the patient's condition. Before it can be rejected by any cause, the doctor must come up with a good reason. INDifferential diagnosis is not excluded more causes because it is possible for patients to be patients with more than one thing at a time. Once the doctor considers all possible factors, it comes up with a working diagnosis and starts treatment.
The patient's condition in treatment is monitored, and if the patient does not improve or deteriorate, the doctor returns to the drawing board. Treatment failure is incorporated into differential diagnosis and the doctor begins again. In a sense, this type of diagnosis is a process of elimination, but it can participate very and very complex, because many diseases and common affliction looks very similar and it is easy for the doctor's introduction.
diagnosis by means of this method may be a puzzle, especially if the patient has symptoms of conflicts or a complex medical history. It is an important part of the practice of internal medicine, a medical specialty that focuses on the diagnosis and treatment of non -surgical conditions in PACIENTES. Internists are sometimes called to help other medical specialists with differential diagnosis because they are able to draw on a wide range of knowledge and experience.