Practical wisdom in medicine
Defending a multidimensional, integrated view of an indispensable virtue
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21702377 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Lauris C Kaldjian (0000-0002-9170-6986, University of Iowa, corresponding author), Kristján Kristjánsson (0000-0002-8584-4178, University of Birmingham), Shane Mcloughlin (0000-0002-2354-5439, University of Birmingham) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Publication date | 2026-05-23 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Metamedicine (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0166-2031 • E-ISSN: 1573-1200 |
| Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s11017-026-09760-7 |
| PMID | 42174335 |
| OpenAlex | W7162106266 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 42 |
By defending practical wisdom ( phronesis ) as a multidimensional virtue that complements the moral virtues, we offer a critique of “practical wisdom eliminativism”, with special attention to the context of medicine, arguing that the core dimensions of practical wisdom enjoy broad consensus. As the meta-virtue that demonstrates excellence in ethical decision-making, practical wisdom recognizes and employs the best means to achieve good and worthwhile ends by integrating goals, perception of context, moral virtues, deliberation, reason-guided emotion, and motivation. In medicine, practical wisdom encompasses patient-centered deliberation directed toward ends of health and flourishing that promote the patient’s good. To counter the notion that practical wisdom is a redundant concept (the eliminativist view), we provide philosophical arguments, evidence from medical practitioners, and psychometric data from a detailed empirical study of US and UK adults. Practical wisdom has survived for more than 2300 years as a unified and unifying intellectual meta-virtue that guides the moral virtues. We believe the reasons we put forward explain why phronesis should be expected to endure as a meaningful, multidimensional concept reflecting the nature of moral deliberation in response to practical challenges in life and medicine
Deliberation · Excellence · Flourishing · Phronesis · Practical wisdom · Virtue · Virtue ethics · Aging and Gerontology Research · Empathy and Medical Education · Patient Dignity and Privacy
Intellectual Virtues
The Virtues In Medical Practice
Phronesis (Practical Wisdom) as a Type of Contextual Integrative Thinking
The Science of Wisdom in a Polarized World
A Second Rebuttal On Health
What is compassion and how can we measure it? A review of definitions and measures
Aristotle
Wellness versus flourishing in medical education
Contributions of neo-Aristotelian phronesis to ethical medical practice
Phronesis as moral decathlon
Practical wisdom in medicine through the eyes of medical students and physicians
Seeking medical wisdom
Can we measure practical wisdom
Where's the Educational Virtue in Flourishing
The Gappiness of the “Gappiness Problem”
The concepts of health and illness revisited
Phronesis
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |