Biomedicine: Scientific Medicine Prominent in Western Societies

Health, how it is defined and how it is maintained, is a reflection of the dominant ideology in a certain society. The medical system of Western countries, including Australia, is based on the biomedical model of health or biomedicine. According to Lord Nigel Crisp, who is a global health reform advocate, former Chief Executive of the National Health Service (NHS) in United Kingdom (UK) and previous Permanent Secretary of the UK Department of Health, Western scientific medicine and the health systems based on them have exhibited spectacular success in improving health over the last century and it has come to dominate medical thinking, habits and institutions globally. It also served as the guide for health regulating bodies including the World Health Organization, health care professional associations and pharmaceutical companies. He argued, however, that presently Western scientific medicine is no longer capable of solely managing the health demands of peoples in both the industrialised and developing countries. There is a need to adapt and absorb new ideas to be able to meet the demands of the twenty first century(Marble, 2010). In order to get a better understanding of the current health system in Western societies this paper attempts to take a closer look at the development of scientific medicine as the foundation of modern medical practice. In addition to the overview of biomedicine, a few of the challenges to its discourse will also be presented throughout the discussion.

The term biomedicine is used to describe scientific medicine which is prominent in Western societies. To get a better grasp of this concept, Baronov (2008) presented the following interrelated views which account for biomedicine’s ongoing development. Fi...

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