The perils of teaching medical triads in medical education.

CLINICAL competence; DECISION making; DIAGNOSIS; DIFFERENTIAL diagnosis; DIAGNOSTIC errors; MEDICAL education; PHYSICAL diagnosis; TEACHING methods

The authors discuss a report about the perils of teaching medical triads in medical education. Topics discussed include misdiagnosis due to the use of clinical triads when less experienced clinicians use them as pattern-recognising techniques, the use of memory-based techniques by junior clinicians like triads to aid their diagnoses, and the significance of using medical triads to clinicians when paired with a sound clinical education.