Med Soc Chapter 10
Faith Healing and Religion:Five general categories:
1.Self-treatment through prayer 2.Treatment by a layperson thought to be able to communicate with God 3.Treatment by an official church leader as one of their duties 4.Healing obtained from a person or group who practice healing full time without an affiliation with a major religious organization 5.Healing obtained from religious healers who practice full time and are affiliated with a major religious group
Folk Healing: African American Folk Healers
Belief system does not differentiate between science and religion
Curanderos and curanderas
Mexican American folk healers
Folk Healing
Still used by some low-income and minority populations
osteopaths
osteopaths are part of mainstream medicine, and they work as physicians with the added skill of training in spinal procedures
Faith healers are
people who use the power of suggestion, prayer, and faith in God to promote healing
Religion is associated
with positive levels of health and lower mortality
Navajos
-Traditional rituals may last several days, lead by a singer -Illness is seen as caused by soul loss, witchcraft, spirit possession, or violations of tribal taboos -Emphasis on cause of illness, diseases classified by causes rather than symptoms -Practices declining because fewer men trained as singers, long ceremonies are increasingly difficult to afford
Folk practices
have persisted in modern societies largely because of dissatisfaction with professional medicine and a cultural gap between biomedical practitioners and particular patients
Those who use faith and folk healers typically come from
lower-class background and use these practitioners because they are inexpensive and culturally similar
Persons who use some form of alternative or "new age" medicine tend to have
middle- or working-class social backgrounds
Osteopaths achieved professional respectability by
moving away from an exclusive focus on spinal manipulation techniques to treat general health problems