The Anthropologies of Illness and Sickness

TLDR

Medical anthropology examines how biomedical knowledge is socially produced, with scholars focusing on improving clinical efficacy and exploring illness beyond the healing process. The study aims to determine how medical anthropological research can augment clinical effectiveness by enhancing patient education, addressing noncompliance, and challenging maladaptive treatments. The authors propose interventions that improve patient education, resolve noncompliance issues, and contest maladaptive treatment pathways.

Abstract

ion. [In this connection, see analogous arguments by Navarro (126) and Assennato & Navarro (7, pp. 224--30) on the social production of knowledge of occupational medicine, and Latour & Woolgar (102) on the social production of biomedical knowledge.] Efficacy and Productivity What is the importance of medical anthropological research for the people about whom medical anthropologists write? EM writers are quite clear on this point: their practical interest is in the issue of medical efficacy. That is, they want to augment the effectiveness of clinical medicine in the context of the healing process. For example, they want to enhance patient educa­ tion, remedy problems of noncompliance, and challenge maladaptive courses of treatment. On the other hand, the writers I have identified with the anthropology of sickness perspective are oriented to a point beyond the healing process, the inner logic of illness, and the consciousness of the individual. Their practical interest is in what can be called medical produc-