Overconfidence, Time-on-Task, and Medical Errors: Is There a Relationship?

• Main Authors: Al-Maghrabi M, Mamede S, Schmidt HG, Omair A, Al-Nasser S, Alharbi NS, Magzoub MEMA
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Dove Medical Press 2024
• Subjects: overconfidence; diagnostic accuracy; medical errors; premature closure; Special aspects of education; LC8-6691; Medicine (General); R5-920; sami
• Online Access: https://doaj.org/article/24ed49491f8c465bbdfd98bdab16d9d5

Mohsin Al-Maghrabi,1 Silvia Mamede,2 Henk G Schmidt,3 Aamir Omair,4– 6 Sami Al-Nasser,4– 6 Nouf Sulaiman Alharbi,4– 6 Mohi Eldin Mohammed Ali Magzoub7 1Department of Pediatrics, Imam Abdulrahman Alfaisal Hospital, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; 2Institute of Medical Education Research Rotterdam, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, the Netherlands; 3Department of Psychology, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, the Netherlands; 4Department of Medical Education, College of Medicine, King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; 5King Abdullah International Medical Research Center, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; 6Ministry of the National Guard - Health Affairs, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; 7Department of Medical Education, United Arab Emirates University, Al Ain, United Arab EmiratesCorrespondence: Nouf Sulaiman Alharbi, Department of Medical Education, College of Medicine, King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Email [e-mail]: Literature suggest that physicians’ high level of confidence has a negative impact on medical decisions, and this may lead to medical errors. Experimental research is lacking; however, this study investigated the effects of high confidence on diagnostic accuracy.Methods: Forty internal medicine residents from different hospitals in Saudi Arabia were divided randomly into two groups: A high-confidence group as an experimental and a low-confidence group acting as a control. Both groups solved each of eight written complex clinical vignettes. Before diagnosing these cases, the high-confidence group was led to believe that the task was easy, while the low-confidence group was presented with information from which it could deduce that the diagnostic task was difficult. Level of confidence, response time, and diagnostic accuracy were recorded.Results: The participants in the high-confidence group had a significantly higher confidence level than those in the control group: 0.75 compared to 0.61 (maximum 1.00). However, ...