A method that can be useful in diagnosis is the process of hypothesis then match.
Method 1:
(1) hypothesis generation: If diagnosis A is true, then feature X should be present.
(2) match: If X is present, then X is ruled-in. If X is absent, then X is ruled-out.
Method 2:
(1) hypothesis generation: If diagnosis A is true, then feature X should be absent.
(2) match: If X is absent, then X is ruled-in. If X is present, then X is ruled-out.
This works well when the feature has a high probability for being present or absent in a condition. If not, then rule-in/rule-out is difficult; however, it still can be used to rank diagnoses.
This is useful to prune a list. Other methods can be used on the short list to reach a diagnosis.
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