Medical students are taught about and examined a lot on clinical guidelines. What is best for patients overall, as recommended in guidelines, may not be appropriate for individuals. Blanket recommendations, rather than a menu of options or recommendations for shared decision making, ignore patients' preferences.

So what do guidelines mean in practice? When do we deviate from them when your clinical acumen is telling you that guidelines may not be the best fit?

Expert guest: Dr Liam Loftus is a GP trainee and a National Medical Director’s Clinical Fellow who has worked with the Personalised Care Institute.

Recommended reading:

How can tomorrow’s doctors be more caring? A phenomenological investigation. Link: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/medu.13684

Potential benefits, limitations, and harms of clinical guidelines. Link: www.bmj.com/content/318/7182/527

Check us out on social media:

Twitter: twitter.com/BMJStudent

Instagram: www.instagram.com/bmj_student/

Facebook: www.facebook.com/BMJStudent/