A label too far: Overdiagnosis and medicalisation with Prof. Bjørn Hofmann

This podcast episode evolves from the previous and covers topics such as:

• Distinguishing between the concepts of medicalisation and overdiagnosis and discuss their main drivers
• How medicine, health care, and health professionals have become ever more diligent in defining, detecting, preventing, and treating disease – covering more ground than ever and how this can lead to the adverse situation of overdiagnosis
• The positive and adverse effects of giving someone diagnosis
• What Bjørn terms the ‘asymmetry of aversion’ meaning that for many health professionals is worse to overlook something than to over do something which may facilitate over diagnosis
• The role of AI and machine learning to address the crudeness and imprecision in some our diagnostic labelling and processes
• High and low-value care and the role of healthcare economics on how readily we dip into the diagnostic toolkit and medical testing
• How the expansion in the concept of disease (and diagnosis) has lead to over diagnosis and medicalization
• What can we do to reduce the detrimental expansion of disease and subsequent over diagnosis