Sociological models of health

Authors Avatar by wal5596 (student)

The biomedical model of health treats an illness as something that is wrong with the workings of the body, caused by such things as germs, disease or accidents, but it does not take into account social or mental factors. It gives doctors a set of guidelines to work to such as putting the patients care as the top priority, to do no harm and to provide a cure if available for the patient. These guidelines may seem obvious to the patient but there are some less obvious guidelines such as no blame must be attached to the patient no matter what the cause or condition of the illness and that the illness is biological and only biological. The focus is on objective laboratory tests rather than the history of the patient. It is these guidelines that make the biological model so effective when treating patients; the biological model is most effective when dealing with illness or disease that has a social stigma attached to it such as HIV it allows the patient to be treated without any assumptions about how they contracted the disease and with the knowledge that the doctor will attach no blame to them they will just treat the illness. The biomedical model of health on which contemporary medical practice is based has four core elements, Mind-body dualism, Specific aetiology, Mechanical metaphor and objective science. (Haralambos, 2008)

Mind-body dualism is the concept that the mind and our way of thinking can be separated from the body and in the long term it states that disease is the outcome of a malfunction in the body, while wider social factors such as environment and social statues care seen as irrelevant. Specific aetiology assumes there is a specific cause for disease such as a virus or bacteria. Mechanical metaphor is also derived from the specific aetiology theory and was to examine an individual for symptoms and then match these symptoms to the known symptoms of a specific disease. Objective science uses scientific methods to provide the truth about the objects under study. Medicine fully subscribes to this belief and “seeks the origins of ill health through rigorous research techniques” (Haralambos, 2008)

Join now!

There are criticisms of the biomedical model of health (McKeown 1979) argues that ‘the improvement of health during the past three centuries was due essentially to provisions of food, protection from hazards, and limitations of numbers’. He does not dispute the role of medicine overall but argues that ‘it is often sometimes extremely effective; but often it is ineffective and only tides the patient over a short illness, leaving the underlying disease, condition and prognosis essentially unchanged. (Haralambos, 2008)

The social model of health looks at how society and our environment affect our everyday health and well-being, and includes factors ...

This is a preview of the whole essay