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Strengths and limitations of the psychiatric classification system
Positives and negatives of medicalisation
Positives and negatives of medicalisation
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Conrad, who was a medical sociology teacher discusses how the way they classify disease and illness has changed over time. Conrad talks about how illnesses, that are “behavioral,” mental illnesses, has become medical diagnosis and medical treatments, medicalization. Medicalization is defined as a process in which nonmedical problems are not being classified as medical problems. Conrad touches on the rise of medicalization, the social factors that have influenced it. Medicalization, viewed as a social construct, it is a form of collective action. Medicalization would have not happened if it wasn’t from the support of physicians and the medical professions, they were central to this whole medicalization. The controversies and critiques of medicalization
A physician has an unenviable position; he is closest to man approaching a god-like stature. And despite the demise of 'doctor knows best', we still need to trust his diagnosis-something that is increasingly difficult in a world where information is widely available, and Google substitutes for a doctor. In the case of psychiatry the issue of trust is amplified since diagnosis is based on a patient's expressed thoughts and overt behaviours rather than solely on biological phenomena. And these thoughts and behaviours are influenced by the patient's environment-a mix of his social, cultural and technological experiences.
Mental health is a relevant issue in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Not only is Kurtz’ mental health questionable throughout the novel, but Marlow also has to be examined by a physician, to check both his physical and mental status, before he starts on the journey to Africa. The mental health community in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was not nearly as developed as it is today, but many developments during this time period had a profound impact on the way we analyze the human psyche and mental health today.
...y. The doctors could also prescribe varied treatment to different groups of patients who have distinct symptoms. Third, since patients in the same group tended to have similar interests, they could build friendship after communicating with each other every day. Therefore, they would ease stress and achieve happiness, creating a better condition for their convalescence. All of the above reasons manifest the importance of classification in the moral treatment.
...e gap in attitudes between pre-medicalized and modern time periods. The trends of technological advancement and human understanding project a completely medicalized future in which medical authorities cement their place above an intently obedient society.
Peter Conrad’s book, The Medicalization of Society: On the Transformation of Human Conditions into Treatable Disorders, examined several cases of human conditions, once viewed as normal, now considered as medical issues. Conrad defined this transition of human problems to disorders that are medically defined, studied, diagnosed and treated as “medicalization”. Specifically, Conrad discussed certain conditions, such as adult ADHD, as age related phenomena that have been medicalized. Throughout, Conrad demonstrated how these issues became medically defined because of the current research and financing structure of medicine in the United States. Those newly defined illnesses changed people’s perceptions and expectations of health and old age, thus dramatically altering society’s expectations of medicine and subsequent life quality. Conrad’s ethnography is a good example of the ethnomedical approach to medical anthropology that addressed several health conditions that are prominent in the United States. He culminated his book by arguing medicalization primarily serves as a form of social control, solving problems with individuals and not society. While the book clearly explained a wide range of negative causes and effects of medicalization, Conrad only acknowledged a few examples of successful resistance briefly in his last chapter. In order to empower its readers beyond education, the book should have examined these instances of anti-medicalization to find similarities and derive productive countermeasures for individuals to follow. Conrad thoroughly outlined the history, examples and influencing factors that promote medicalization, but failed to offer any combative solution to the resulting problems of medicalization.
We are taught in medical school how to care for individuals. These are important lessons we should not forget. However, I came now to understand that there are many examples where both the problem and solution lie outside the physician’s office; it was very frustrating that I was not able to conduct the medical care I learnt and I was aspiring to do. smoking; obesity; heart disease; consanguineous marriages; war; refugees; poverty and violence.
In conclusion, this critique has critically examined the view that medicine is a form of social control. Discussing the views of theorists such as Talcott Parsons, Ivan Illich, Narvarro, Irving Zola and Foucault. These theorists have views about how dominating medicine can be in society, the power of the professionals and medicalisation how it refers social problems into medical problems. Throughout this critique, it has been made clear that medicine is a form of social control.
After the loss of a loved one, the family is always left with a burden. Sometimes there’s a deep regret for not done enough while the person was still around and sometimes there’s guilt, feeling like you’re to blame for the person’s death. In the film, Ordinary People, the Jerrett brothers, Conrad and Buck, are in a boating accident and sadly, Buck, the older brother, passes away. Conrad is left to mourn the loss of his only brother and also to feel a deep guilt for the outcome on that unfortunate day.
It was found that the “social deviance represented by the ill - sections of the population who abandoned social roles (for example, employees, mothers, soldiers) so essential to the maintenance and longevity of the social organism” (Thomas 2012). Because of the threat of sickness affecting the eminence of society as a human body, functionalists believe that doctors are holders of patients status which maintain the order of the biological society. The theorist Emile Durkheim believed that medicine could play a crucial role in determining social normal and abnormal. The use of medical sociology “thrived on this normal/deviant dualism, not least because medical sociology mirrored the enlightenment inspired normal/pathological bifurcation in medicine” (Thomas 2012). By the use of medicine, doctors are able to regulate the access to the sick role and its benefits. Through this ability to regulate the sick role, doctors are also able to determine the proper function of those in society who are sick and how they will affect the structure of society. This control of how sick individuals is given to a member of society who will occupy a high social class due to the occupational prestige they have gained. By a member of the elite group to stabilities and balance society, they are able to justify the status quo, in return maintaining their power over sick individuals. This ability to have control over a lower social status is not to claim that they are of higher power but that there are structural valuables which affect their ability to have power over
Without personal access to authors, readers are left to themselves to interpret literature. This can become challenging with more difficult texts, such as Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness. Fortunately, literary audiences are not abandoned to flounder in pieces such as this; active readers may look through many different lenses to see possible meanings in a work. For example, Conrad’s Heart of Darkness may be deciphered with a post-colonial, feminist, or archetypal mindset, or analyzed with Freudian psycho-analytic theory. The latter two would effectively reveal the greater roles of Kurtz and Marlow as the id and the ego, respectively, and offer the opportunity to draw a conclusion about the work as a whole.
Whenever someone is feeling ill they usually go to see their doctor; who will prescribe some medication that will make them feel much better. Medicine is a field that has always been fascinating because it is something that is in high demand and it is constantly changing. Physicians do not only turn to medicine as the top source of curing patients. They also believe that social medicine and public health are strong tools to help prevent diseases and keep people healthy. Rudolf Carl Virchow is a man who really stood out in his line of work as a German physician. He was also known for being a pathologist, anthropologist, writer and politician. He made great discoveries in science and medicine that really changed the course of history. Throughout Virchow’s life, he has changed the way in which doctors deal with their everyday activities. It has been his strive
Sociology of Health and Illness The sociological approaches focus on identifying the two sociological theories. We critically analysed the biomedical model and doctor-patient relationship. We also evaluated how the medical professionals exercise social control and the medical professional’s contribution to ill health. The difference between society and health is studied by sociologists in relation to health and illness.
Joseph Conrad was born Joseph Teodor Konrad Korzenioski in 1857 in Berdichev, Ukraine. He officially changed his name to Joseph Conrad in 1886, when he became a British citizen (Liukkonen). Although Conrad discouraged people from interpreting his literature through analysis his life, his life did shape his writing.
Joseph Conrad was born on December 3, 1957 in Ukraine under the Russian Empire. He was of Polish descent and he wrote many novels and short stories. Joseph Conrad’s father was part of a committee that promoted an uprising against the Russian government. He was caught and exiled to northern Russia with his son of four years and his wife who contracted tuberculosis and passed away. Conrad and his father read the works of Dickens, James Fenimore Cooper, and more. Conrad spent time at seas and many of his prose reflect his adventures at sea, dangers he faced, and places he visited. He attempted suicide after one of his adventures at sea from which he returned in a high amount of debt. “Heart of Darkness” is largely based on his traumatic and damaging
Modernism began as a movement in that late 19th, early 20th centuries. Artists started to feel restricted by the styles and conventions of the Renaissance period. Thusly came the dawn of Modernism in many different forms, ranging from Impressionism to Cubism.