Health & Medicine / Anthropology / American History / Sociology
|
Biomedicine
and Alternative Healing Systems in America In a country where the dominant paradigm of biomedicine (medical schools, research hospitals, clinics staffed by M.D.s and R.N.s,) has been long established and supported by laws and regulations, the continuing appeal of other medical systems and subsystems bears careful consideration. Distinctions of class, Baer emphasizes, as well as differences in race, ethnicity, and gender, are fundamental to the diversity of beliefs, techniques, and social organizations represented in the phenomenon of medical pluralism. Baer traces
the simultaneous emergence in the nineteenth century of formalized
biomedicine and of homeopathy, botanic medicine, hydropathy,
Christian Science, osteopathy, and chiropractic. He examines
present-day osteopathic medicine as a system parallel to biomedicine
with an emphasis on primary care; chiropractic, naturopathy,
and acupuncture as professionalized heterodox medical systems;
homeopathy, herbalism, bodywork, and lay midwifery in the context
of the holistic health movement; Anglo-American religious healing;
and folk medical systems, particularly among racial and ethnic
minorities. In closing, he focuses on the persistence of folk
medical systems among working-class Americans and considers the
growing interest of biomedical physicians, pharmaceutical and
health care corporations, and government in the holistic health
movement |
July
2001 SHOPPING
CART OPERATIONS
Never
ordered from us before? |
|
|
|
|