Exploring Rhizomatic Thinking in Clinical Reasoning

Mental models of health and illness used during clinicalClinical practice are predominantly based on reductionism and mechanistic explanations. SystemsSystems thinkingThinking offers a more holistic conceptualization by viewing the human body to consist of several closely linked organ systems, constantly interacting with each other and embedded in, and ‘open’ to, the external environment. Operationalizing this view to clinicalClinical reasoningReasoning at the bedside requires networked thinking, concept maps, and tools such as Clinical Reasoning Map (CRM). These are diagrammatic methods that explicitly depict the links across multiple nodes such as diseases, disorders, clinical features, and pathogenetic mechanisms. SystemsSystems thinkingThinking could be extended to rhizomaticRhizomatic thinking where a metaphorMetaphor of the rhizomeRhizome is applied to view complex clinical scenarios. It helps to deepen the understanding of the interconnected nature of cases and the multiple pathogenic pathways, generate differential diagnoses, and predict future prognostic pathways. In the case of planning and providing care, rhizomatic thinkingThinking will shift emphasis from a biomedical model to include the social systems, ecosystems, and the built environment. It adds to the growing corpus of novel complex thinking such as whole systems thinkingThinking and synergetics, described by Edgar Morin. It is a novel approach to clinicalClinical practice, clinical reasoningReasoning and its pedagogy.