Formulating treatment recommendation as a logical consequence of the diagnosis in post-surgical oncological visits

The article analyzes how a doctor delivers diagnoses and recommends treatment in a set of post-surgical oncological visits. The pattern of activities are explored in two different cases: when all diagnostic information is available, and when information is still missing. The data consist of 12 video-recorded visits of breast cancer patients to a senior oncologist. Conversation analysis is employed to analyze sequences in which the delivery of diagnosis and treatment recommendation unfold. The oncologist formulates the treatment recommendation as a logical consequence deriving from the available diagnostic information. In cases when definitive diagnostic information on the cancer type is missing, the oncologist opts to anticipate hypothetical diagnostic scenarios, and to draw the therapeutic alternatives as logical outcomes envisionable from each of the different scenarios.