Who’s the Expert Here? Negotiating Expertise in Palliative Care and Transplant Medicine

This chapter explores how different understandings of expert knowledge shape ethnographic research and knowledge production in biomedical contexts, drawing on long-term fieldwork conducted in a transplant clinic in Germany and a palliative care centre in Switzerland. These settings represent distinct forms of biomedical practice, with transplant medicine emphasising high-tech surgical interventions and palliative care focusing on holistic patient care. By comparing these settings, the chapter examines the methodological and epistemological implications of differing conceptions of expertise. I argue that while methodological differences can be explained by research foci and medical fields explored, they also shed light on different understandings of expertise within these settings. The first part of the chapter examines methodological specificities in biomedical contexts and how they influence fieldwork practices, including considerations such as wardrobe choices and the symbolism of white coats. The second part focuses on the post-fieldwork phase, highlighting the challenges anthropologists face in publishing their research across disciplinary boundaries. I conclude by highlighting the evolving nature of expertise over the course of an academic career, and the importance of experiential knowledge and participatory approaches in fostering interdisciplinary dialogue within biomedicine and anthropology.