Overview

Abstract

The concept of diagnosis has importance in medicine because of what it does. Phenomenologically based diagnosis communicates an enormous amount of information succinctly and clearly on which all recipients agree. For example, the two words, pneumococcal pneumonia, communicate with clarity and precision to all medically knowledgeable recipients the world over a series of statistically likely characteristics regarding the following attributes of that diagnosis: etiology, clinical appearance, history of the course of the illness, physical examination findings, natural history both treated and untreated, laboratory findings, x-ray appearance, treatment, prognosis, and inheritability. Thus, the first obligatory characteristic of a valid diagnosis is that it reliably communicate previously agreed on empirically derived information.