Editor—Gabbay and le May's study on how primary care practitioners decide and use knowledge identifies a polarisation in healthcare research and development.1 On the one side are those who see health care as a linear system that can be understood by reduction to its component parts with a simple relation between cause and effect. On the other side are those who see the system as inherently complex, in which input and output relations are uncertain but patterns emerge that could not be predicted on the basis of analysing the underlying parts.
Although the subject is in its infancy, non-linear systems theory is beginning to offer new approaches to investigating complex systems.2,3 The trick is to match the analytical approach to the complexity of the system under study. Complex environments need regulatory systems that match their complexity. The current modernisation agenda reflects a reductionist approach that inhibits the development of mindlines and mindfulness which is detrimental to the evolution of systems.
Competing interests: None declared.
References
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