ArticleMedicine, health care, and philosophy2022
The hermeneutics of symptoms.
Article in Medicine, health care, and philosophy, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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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.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Acceptability and Utility of a Web-Based Patient-Completed Clinical Decision Aid for the Differential Diagnosis of Transient Loss of Consciousness: Qualitative Interview Study.JMIR formative research · 2025Article
- Network Analysis of Contemporaneous Symptoms and Identification of Core Symptoms in Patients with Lumbar Disc Herniation.Journal of pain research · 2025Article
- Explanation for symptoms and biographical repair in a clinic for persistent physical symptoms.SSM. Qualitative research in health · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
Abstract
The clinical encounter begins with presentation of an illness experience; but throughout that encounter, something else is constructed from it - a symptom. The symptom is a particular interpretation of that experience, useful for certain purposes in particular contexts. The hermeneutics of medicine - the study of the interpretation of human experience in medical terms - has largely taken the process of symptom-construction to be transparent, focussing instead on how constellations of symptoms are interpreted as representative of particular conditions. This paper examines the hermeneutical activity of symptom-construction more closely. I propose a fourfold account of the clinical function of symptoms: as theoretical entities; as tools for communication; as guides to palliative intervention; and as candidates for medical explanation or intervention. I also highlight roles they might play in illness experience. I use this framework to discuss four potential failures of symptom-interpretation: failure of symptom-type and symptom-token recognition; loss of the complete picture of illness experience through overwhelming emphasis on its symptomatic interpretation; and intersubjective feedback effects of symptom description altering the ill person's own perceptions of their phenomenal experience. I conclude with some suggestions of potential remedies for failures in the process of symptom-construction.
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Registered trials
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.