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The workshop is over. We are now working on an edited collection of papers. The papers explore diagnostic work:

The ability to notice trouble and see scope for remedial action is crucial in many different contexts of work. Doctors, mechanics, help-line operators, firefighters, experimental scientists, the police, teachers, surveyors, computer programmers, and many other professionals do it. Diagnoses are often both difficult to produce and hard to communicate. Although frequently conceived as a 'moment' of cognition, diagnosis can also be seen as a material, collaborative process involving expert skills, careful sensory and sensitive engagement with human agencies (e.g. in medical consultations, teaching or policing), and non-human agencies (e.g. physiological or material 'actants', 'bugs' in computer code, etc.). Some activities involve rational everyday knowledge, some demand 'scientific' epistemic practices – e.g. measurement, experiment and intervention, representations and calculations, and some also require other, creative, emotional and intuitive ways of knowing. Diagnostic practices are a pervasive and important feature of contemporary life. They matter, not least because it is through diagnosing and diagnoses that different perspectives - e.g. novices and experts, users, developers and designers, patients and healthcare professionals - meet. Diagnostic practices are integral to any move towards change. A deeper and broader understanding of diagnosing practices is highly desirable.

In the workshop, we discussed ethnographic, engaged and ethnomethodological studies of diagnostic work in different domains of human activity. Interrelated issues that the contributors addressed included:

• Collaboration. Diagnosing is often a collaborative endeavour, where e.g. patients work with (many) doctors and healthcare personnel, or teams of computer programmers use collaborative tools like Concurrent Versioning Systems (CVS). How is collaboration organised and sustained? Is it made visible or invisible? What is the diagnostic 'object's' role?
• Human-human interaction. Diagnosing demands expert interaction skills. Doctors, help-line operators or teachers must be able to listen, understand and work with their collaborators' competence, as well as their real concerns and problems. Responses must be tailored to fit. What methods do professionals and lay-persons use to interact effectively? Where and how do breakdowns occur? How are they noticed and how are they addressed?
• Human-matter engagement. Engagement with physiological or material agencies often entails sophisticated skills of human-matter 'communication'. People must learn to hear and make matter 'speak'. How do they learn to do this? How does communication take place? What kinds of apparatuses are involved?
• Translations. Interacting with human and material agencies often requires translations. How are these produced and negotiated?
• Relations. Diagnosing brings together novices and experts, users meet developers and designers, patients face investigative technologies, etc. It requires many different, rational, creative and intuitive perceptual and epistemic practices. How are these combined?

Jessica Mesman, University of Maastricht, Holland, Keynote: Resources of Resilience: an ethnographic study of hidden competence in critical care practice Working paper

Marianne Boenik: Dealing with uncertainty in diagnostic practices: a comparison of mammographic screening and DNA-diagnostics for breast cancer Abstract Working paper Ulrik Jorgensen: ‘Keep the raw meat and vegetables apart’ – on the advice and context of diagnosis in the case of food infections Abstract Powerpoint Slides Working paper Roger S. Slack, Rob Procter, Mark Hartswood, Alexander Voss, Mark Rouncefield: Suspicious Minds Abstract

Alexandra Choby: Ethics of Interpretation:  Provisional Strategies for Diagnosing Suspected Seizure Disorders Abstract Working paper Paul Miller: Managing the Challenge: Conflict and Resolution in the Diagnosis of Depression Abstract Working paper Ingunn Moser: Diagnosing and acting upon dementia: the transformative power of the Marte Meo Method as both diagnostic instrument and therapeutic intervention in dementia care Abstract  Working paper Jillan Pooler: Managing the diagnostic space: interactional dilemmas in calls to a telephone health help line Abstract Working paper O’Neill, J., Castellani, S., Grasso A. and F. Roulland: Diagnosing machine problems on the phone: technological inspirations from an ethnography of user-expert interaction Abstract Working paper John Rooksby: Debugging in Software Abstract Working paper

Morana Alac:  On gestures, ethnographic eyes, mechanical hands and videotapes as negotiated features of diagnostic work Inka Koskela: ‘Do you see what I see?’ – When an expert meets a novice Abstract Working paper Tim Rapley, Carl May, Lesley Kay, Helen Foster: Diagnostic touch: the musculoskeletal examination in paediatric rheumatology and physiotherapy Abstract

Christian Licoppe, École Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications, Paris, Keynote: Playing Mogi Working paper

Meg Clinch: Normal Abnormalities: An investigation into the role of non-specific symptoms in the diagnosis, treatment and management of thyroid conditions within a NHS thyroid clinic Abstract Working paper Alice Street: Diagnosis as a By-product of Action in a Papua New Guinean Hospital Abstract Working paper Ingerid Rodseth: The role of intuitive feelings as a diagnostic tool in the criminal investigation process Abstract Working paper

Claus Bossen: Clinical reasoning and material resources: the case of a national standard for electronic patient records in Denmark Abstract Working paper Jacqueline Eke: Finding’ and ‘revealing’ lessons to student teachers: some diagnostic work in teacher education Abstract Working paper Johan M. Sanne:Making matters speak: fault-finding in railway maintenance Abstract Working paper Kristina Groth: Making matters speak: fault-finding in railway mainSupporting a high quality Diagnostic Procedure through Multidisciplinary Collaboration between Medical Specialiststenance Abstract Working paper Marti P., Grönvall E., Pollini A., Rullo A.: Supporting inspection strategies through palpable assemblies Paula Hodgson: Making a Diagnosis with Angiography Abstract Working paper

Slack R., Procter R., Hartswood M., Voss A., Rouncefield M.: Diagnostic Work in Poisons Advising – “Is there anything I need to worry about?” Abstract Working paper Anita Wilson:'The ones that say they'll do it never do, it's the one's you don't expect that string themselves up': Prison Officers' diagnosis of potential suicide and their strategies for continual crisis management Abstract Working paper

Alan Firth, School of Education, Communication and Language Sciences, Newcastle University, UK, Closing Keynote: 'Epiphanies' and Other Aspects of Diagnosis Work in Calls to a Telephone Helpline'

 

 

Monika Buscher Department of Sociology, Lancaster University , LA1 4YD, Email: m.buscher@lancaster.ac.uk

Dawn Goodwin Institute for Health Research, Lancaster University , LA1 4YT , Email: d.s.goodwin@lancaster.ac.uk

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