For interesting reading on the topics of intuition and medicine: From Doctor to Healer : The Transformative Journey by Robbie Davis-Floyd, et al (Paperback - January 1999) Childbirth and Authoritative Knowledge : Cross-Cultural Perspectives by Robbie Davis-Floyd (Editor), Carolyn Fishel Sargent (Editor) (Paperback - July 1997) Intuition : The Inside Story by Robbie Davis-Floyd (Editor), et al (Paperback - June 1997) Also, there is a HUGE difference between 'intuition' (gut feelings, hunch, nagging doubt, whatever) and just "We do it this way because we've always done it this way." Such as: (1) "We can't cup-feed, we have to use bottles, because we've always used bottles." NOT "Because I have a feeling this specific baby would do better feeding from a bottle." (2) "All my patients use Tamoxifen. The drug reps assure me it's safe." NOT "You know, I have a gut feeling that you would benefit from Tamoxifen." (3) "All our babies go back to the nursery for morning rounds." NOT "My intuition is that this specific baby needs to be observed closely by the nurses because just seems not quite right." And you can make up hundreds more examples from your own experiences. There aren't just two categories or motivation/rationales: "intuition" vs. "evidence-based." Rather there is a third category -- called "tradition" -- which is based on neither intuition nor evidence, but is merely following the simple path of doing it the way it's always been done, even though no one has a clue why it's done that way, or if other ways would be better, and even though it may be contrary to what evidence-based practice says (and contrary to intuition). Unfortunately, a lot of what passes for medical care in the US today is "tradition." Kathy Dettwyler _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com *********************************************** The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html