Medical Sociology Exam 1

People living in poverty have the greatest exposure to risk factors producing ill health. Which of the following is a risk factor that is influenced by socioeconomic circumstances?

All of the above

The primary focus of the epidemiologist is on:

Health problems of social aggregates.

In quantitative studies, what variables are used to measure socioeconomic status?

Income, occupational prestige, and education.

Medical sociology is an important area of study because:

It recognizes the role that social factors play in determining or influencing health.

Whose investigations into cholera outbreaks established the foundation of modern epidemiology?

John Snow.

Which of the following plays a particularly important role in the transmission of AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa?

Migrant labor force

Several studies in Britain, with its universal health care, have shown that the equalization of health care alone has _____________ the disparity in health between social classes.

Not Reduced

There are two categories of bioterrorism:

Overt and covert.

The medicine of social spaces is concerned with:

Preventing disease.

The Whitehall studies conducted in Britain demonstrated that regardless of cause of death, which group had the lowest rates of mortality?

Senior Administrators

Since 2000, the number of AIDS cases has sharply increased in what region of the U.S.?

South

Historically, many urban clinics providing treatment for the poor were established primarily as:

Teaching facilities

Which of the following is TRUE about incidence and prevalence?

The incidence for a given disease can be low at the same time that its prevalence is high.

Which is NOT one of the five classes proposed by Weber?

Upper-lower Class

In epidemiology, a "case" refers to:

A single episode of a disorder, illness, or injury involving an individual.

_______________ activity by Latin American men is believed to be important in the infection of a large proportion of females.

Bisexual

The National Statistics Socio-Economic Classification (NS-SEC) is typically used by:

British

In the case of the sick role, illness is seen as __________, and its undesirable nature reinforces the motivation to be healthy.

Deviant

Changes in lifestyle patterns over the past decades has meant that coronary heart disease is now concentrated more among which group?

Poor/lower Class

What group uses preventative services the least?

Poor/lower Class

With the transition to a greater prevalence of chronic diseases, physicians have increasingly had to take which approach to medical care?

"Whole person" care.

What trend(s) reduced tensions between sociologists in medicine and sociologists of medicine?

(1) Most government funding is awarded to research with practical application and (2) Medical sociology itself is converging with general sociology.

Which circumstance(s) particularly affected the development of medical sociology in its early stages?

(1) Pressure to produce work that could be applied to medical practice and health policy and (2) Lack of attention on the role of medicine and health from classical theorists.

In order for a social variable to qualify as a cause of sickness and mortality it must meet which criteria?

*Influence multiple diseases. *Affect diseases through multiple pathways of risks. *Be reproduced over time. *Involve access to resources that can be used to avoid risks.

Germ theory provided a framework for understanding the causal agents of disease. What are the five agents recognized today?

Biological, nutritional, chemical, physical, and social.

The germ theory of disease is a perspective which asserts:

Diseases are caused by a biological agent.

The _____________ study was important for showing that arteriosclerosis does not strike people at random as they age, but that highly susceptible individuals can be identified in advance.

Framingham

One of the earliest attempts in the Western world to formulate principles of health care, based upon rational thought and the rejection of supernatural phenomena, is found in the work of the Greek physician:

Hippocrates.

Decline in deaths from infectious diseases in the second half of the nineteenth century was mainly due to:

Improvements in diet, housing, and public sanitation.

A researcher is interested in reporting how many people in a community were diagnosed with HIV during the past month. He/she would measure the:

Incidence