[quacked]

Great scenario, it perfectly encapsulates what you're talking about.

The way I like to short-circuit this problem is to ask a bunch of experts what they would do if they had the same information, except applied to their own life. As long as you preface it with a promise not to hold them responsible for their answer, they'll often give better advice than the "official recommendation" that they were giving moments before. I've used this with doctors, realtors, home inspectors, plumbers, programmers, managers, retail employees...

"Hey Dr. Neurosurgeon, if you received this scan and you had the possible aneurysm, and you wanted to live as long as possible, what would you do?" If the official recommendation is to not get the clip, but a bunch of neurosurgeons say they personally would get the clip, then I'd probably get the clip.

[nradov]

Physicians as a group are notoriously bad at statistics and prone to err on the side of over treatment.