Box 4.

: Ethnography in the study of professional groups

• Atkinson used an ethnographic approach to study the clinical reasoning in a group of haematologists through observing activities such as grand rounds and clinical lectures.²¹ He showed how the expert knowledge of these physicians emerged as a local and joint production through clinical talk that was simultaneously characterised by confidence, dogmatism, and uncertainty. From this, Atkinson raises important issues about the use of algorithms and decision making models within medicine and whether these acknowledge the complexities of practical work and clinical reasoning.