Role of communicating diagnostic uncertainty in the safety- netting process: insights from a vignette study (17 August 2024)

Summary

‘Safety- netting’ is one strategy for mitigating against harms associated with diagnostic error. Safety-netting is defined as ‘Information shared with a patient or carer, designed to help them identify the need to seek further medical help if their condition fails to improve’.

Although safety-netting is a well-established strategy to mitigate against diagnostic error, but it is not clear how or why doctors communicate diagnostic uncertainty when safety-netting.

This study explores how and why doctors safety-netted in response to several clinical scenarios, within the broader context of exploring how doctors communicate diagnostic uncertainty.

It found that despite recommendations, safety-netting rarely involves explicit communication of diagnostic uncertainty.