Biopsychosocial Model Of Medical Anthropology
Medical anthropology is an important sub-field within anthropology. Medical anthropology includes global health, medical systems, and cross-cultural issues and ideas in health and wellness.
Health systems
Medical anthropologists often research different health systems around the world, offering a comparative outlook. A health system is the course of treatment given to an individual. This involves how an illness is experienced and perceived by an individual, what an individual does about their illness, how the illness is diagnosed, how the illness is treated, who is affected by the illness, and many more ideas. Clearly, medical anthropologists research a wide variety of different variables.
Cross-cultural variants
For many medical anthropologists, it's important to study, recognize, and respect the cross-cultural variants in health, medicine, and wellness. For example, cultures may vary in terms of who is responsible for caring for an ill patient, why a certain physical symptom occurs, who they go to for treatment, and many other topics. …show more content…
In much of the world—particularly North America and Europe—the biomedicinal model is used. In this model, a patient experiences physical symptoms, and is treated for the symptoms and/or the cause of the symptoms. This model is centered around the idea that illness and disease has virtually exclusively physiological causes. A good example of this model would be having a headache, and treating it with a painkiller
Health systems
Medical anthropologists often research different health systems around the world, offering a comparative outlook. A health system is the course of treatment given to an individual. This involves how an illness is experienced and perceived by an individual, what an individual does about their illness, how the illness is diagnosed, how the illness is treated, who is affected by the illness, and many more ideas. Clearly, medical anthropologists research a wide variety of different variables.
Cross-cultural variants
For many medical anthropologists, it's important to study, recognize, and respect the cross-cultural variants in health, medicine, and wellness. For example, cultures may vary in terms of who is responsible for caring for an ill patient, why a certain physical symptom occurs, who they go to for treatment, and many other topics. …show more content…
In much of the world—particularly North America and Europe—the biomedicinal model is used. In this model, a patient experiences physical symptoms, and is treated for the symptoms and/or the cause of the symptoms. This model is centered around the idea that illness and disease has virtually exclusively physiological causes. A good example of this model would be having a headache, and treating it with a painkiller