Paramedics and Basics aren't supposed to diagnose, they are supposed to prevent. Diagnosing is the doctor's job.
I'm not sure I understand what you mean by this. What are paramedics and basics preventing?
I think there may be some confusion as to what exactly a diagnosis is and how it comes about.
di·ag·no·sis (dg-nss)
n. pl. di·ag·no·ses (-sz) Abbr. dx
1. The act or process of identifying or determining the nature and cause of a disease or injury through evaluation of patient history, examination, and review of laboratory data.
"Laboratory data" isn't exclusive to hematology or other biochemical tests. It also incorperates EKG analysis and the correlation of other forms of quantitative data. (like a blood glucose check)
Sometimes a physician has the benefit of large amounts of data from the latest facilities available. Sometimes they do not. Some of the biological samples sent for testing will be determined long after decisions need to be made. But you use what data you have.
There are also several levels of diagnosis. For example, the diagnosis of Acute Coronary Syndrome is rather vague. As are other pathologies such as nephrotic syndrome or closed head injury.
An accurate diagnosis is not always possible. The clinician can only narrow the list of potential pathology and start treating for more specific ones by trial and error and the patient finds relief and the most accurate dx is never discovered or some other therapy is initiated to treat another.
Even among physicians there are different levels of diagnosis. An emergency physician doesn't operate at the same level of accuracy and precision that a pathologist does, or even an internal medicine physician.
Likewise a paramedic does not always operate at the same level as a physician as a basic does not operate at the same level as a medic. But some level of diagnosis is required in order to treat any patient.
"treating signs and symptoms" and all the other catch phrases used to avoid the word "diagnosis" just demonstrates misunderstanding of what "diagnosis" actually is or is a very poor attempt to escape the responsibility associated with clinical decision making.
The language can be argued ad nausum, but in order to treat a patient without some level of diagnosis a provider would have to omit any level of physical exam, history including the chief complaint, and perform no quantitative testing like checking vital signs, blood glucose, EKG, etc.
I can't imagine how anyone could possible do that without initiating every treatment avialable to the provider on every patient they see.
Even at the Paramedic level some treatments oppose others.
