The importance of personal internal feelings ("gut feeling") of general practitioners in the diagnosis of oncological diseases

Abstract

The personal gut feelings evoked by first contact with a patient have only been studied more systematically in this millennium. Two types of personal gut feelings, sense of reassurance and sense of alarm, have been distinguished.

Some studies show that the sense of reassurance can be taken into account in the diagnostic process for patients with new symptoms of serious illness, including cancer diagnoses.

Keywords

• diagnosis
• cancer
• gut feeling
• sense of reassurance
• sense of alarm