5. Lay Beliefs; Health Promotion Flashcards
Why is understanding lay beliefs important in medical practice?
They can impact: health behaviour, illness behaviour, compliant/non-compliance with treatment.
Distinguish between deniers, distancers, and pragmatists in treatment adherence.
Deniers - don’t accept diagnosis of disease causing them to need the treatment.
Distancers - only half accept diagnosis, downplay how serious it is.
Pragmatist - don’t use preventative medication, only medicate based on acute exacerbation of disease.
What are lay beliefs?
Ways people try to understand and make sense of areas in their liver about which they have no specialised knowledge.
What are some of the distinctive features of lay beliefs?
They’re from people with no specialist knowledge, socially embedded, and may lead to rejection of specialist knowledge if it is a competing idea.
What is the purpose of lay epidemiology?
To try to understand why and how illness happens.
Where do ideas about lay epidemiology come from?
Person, familial, and social sources of knowledge.
What is the negative definition of health?
Health is the absence of illness.
Which groups hold the negative definition of health?
Lower socioeconomic groups.
What is the functional definition of health?
Health is the ability to do certain things.
What is the positive definition of health?
Health is the state of wellbeing and fitness.
Which groups hold the positive definition of health?
Higher socioeconomic groups.
What is a health behaviour?
Activity undertaken for the purpose of maintaining health and preventing illness.
What is an illness behaviour?
Activity of an ill person to define illness and seek solution.
What is meant by the symptom/illness iceberg?
Most symptoms never get to a doctor.
What is sick role behaviour?
Formal response to symptoms, including seeking professional help.
What is the lay referral system?
The chain of advice-seeking contacts which the sick make with other lay people prior to or instead of seeking help from health care professionals.
Why is the lay referral system important to be aware of?
75% of those visiting a doctor have discussed their symptoms with another person.
What are determinants of health?
Factors that have a powerful and cumulative effect on health of the population as they shape behaviours and risk factors.
What are the main global social causes of ill health?
Poverty, social exclusion, poor housing, poor health system.
What is primary prevention?
Interventions that aim to prevent the onset of disease or injury by reducing exposure to risk factors.
What is secondary prevention?
Interventions that aim to detect and treat a disease at an early stage to prevent progression.
What is tertiary prevention?
Interventions that aim to minimise effects of an established disease.
What are some health promotion strategies?
Medial or preventive, behavioural change, educational, empowerment, social change.
Outline the dilemmas of health promotion.
Ethics of interfering, victim blaming, information doesn’t always give people power, reinforcing negative stereotypes, unequal distribution of responsibility, prevention paradox.
