Carlos Ramon Hölzing, Julia van der Linde, Stephan Kersting, Alexandra Busemann

• Introduction Clinical decision‐making is based on objective and subjective criteria, including healthcare workers impressions and feelings. This research examines the perception and implications of a ‘bad feeling’ experienced by healthcare professionals, focusing on its prevalence and characteristics. Methods A cross‐sectional paper‐based survey was conducted from January to July 2023 at the University Medicine Greifswald and the hospital Sömmerda involving physicians, nurses, medical students and trainees from various specialties. With ethics committee approval, participants were recruited and surveyed at regular clinical events. Data analysis was performed using SPSS® Statistics. The manuscript was written using the Strobe checklist. Results Out of 250 questionnaires distributed, 217 were valid for analysis after a 94.9% return rate and subsequent exclusions. Sixty‐five per cent of respondents experience the ‘bad feeling’ occasionally to frequently. There was a significant positive correlation between the frequency of ‘bad feeling’ and work experience. The predominant cause of this feeling was identified as intuition, reported by 79.8% of participants, with 80% finding it often helpful in their clinical judgement. Notably, in 16.1% of cases, the ‘bad feeling’ escalated in the further clinical course into an actual emergency. Furthermore, 60% of respondents indicated that this feeling occasionally or often serves as an early indicator of a potential, yet unrecognised, emergency in patient care. Conclusions This study demonstrates the relevance of clinical experience to decision‐making. As an expression of this, there is a correlation between the frequency of a ‘bad feeling’ and the number of years of experience. It is recommended that the ‘bad feeling’ be deliberately acknowledged and reinforced as an early warning signal for emergency situations, given its significant implications for patient safety. Future initiatives could include advanced training and research, as well as tools such as pocket maps, to better equip healthcare professionals in responding to this intuition.