Evidence map›Paper›PMID 29264706›Full record

ArticleMedicine, health care, and philosophy2018

From art to science: a new epistemological status for medicine? On expectations regarding personalized medicine.

Urban Wiesing

Abstract read
PubMed Publisher
In one paragraph

Article in Medicine, health care, and philosophy, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
4citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

4 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. What Is Precision Psychotherapy?The Journal of medicine and philosophy · 2026
    Article
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Precision in health care.Medicine, health care, and philosophy · 2018
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author.

Urban WiesingInstitute for Ethics and the History of Medicine, University of Tübingen, Gartenstr. 47, 72074, Tübingen, Germany. urban.wiesing@uni-tuebingen.de.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4957-4323

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Personalized medicine plays an important role in the development of current medicine. Among the numerous statements regarding the future of personalized medicine, some can be found that accord medicine a new scientific status. Medicine will be transformed from an art to a science due to personalized medicine. This prognosis is supported by references to models of historical developments. The article examines what is meant by this prognosis, what consequences it entails, and how feasible it is. It refers to the long tradition of epistemological thinking in medicine and the use of historical models for the development of medicine. The possible answers to the question "art or science" are systematized with respect to the core question about the relationship between knowledge and action. The prediction for medicine to develop from an 'empirical healing art' to a 'rational, molecular science' is nonsensical from an epistemological point of view. The historical models employed to substantiate the development of personalized medicine are questionable.

Indexed as

ArtHumansKnowledgeMedicinePrecision MedicineScienceEpistemologyHistory of medicineIndividualized medicineMedicine as artMedicine as scienceNomologicalNomopragmaticPersonalized medicine

Identifiers

PMID29264706

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.