Chapter 9 & 10: health services Flashcards
Placebos
inert substances or sham treatments
Psychosocial factors of symptom perception
expectations of the effect of a treatment drug, classical conditioning, specific phenomena like medical student’s disease and mass psychogenic illness, gender and cultural differences
Nocebo phenomenon
when patients taking an active medication perceive manufactured sensations or side effects that may not be the direct result of a drug; can be due to difference in vigilance and health worries
Placebo effect
ANY medical procedure that produces an effect due to its therapeutic intent (i.e. user’s beliefs and experiences about the intervention) rather than its specific nature (i.e. its actual physical or chemical properties)
What treatment typically creates a placebo effect?
prescribed medications and their pharmacological effects
Randomized controlled trials
measures the efficacy of a drug under optimal conditions, typically using a control group; susceptible to placebo effect
Factors that influence the placebo effect
pill color, size, branding, dosage, and price; description of the placebo as a stimulant or a depressant; kinds of placebo
How does pill color influence its placebo effect?
green and blue pills have sedative effects; red and yellow pills have stimulant effects; white pills are associated with pain meds
What characteristics of a placebo are more likely to produce a stronger effect?
injections rather than pills; capsules rather than tablets, higher dosage of pills; pills that are larger, branded, and priced higher; being given in a formal setting; provider’s warmth, confidence, empathy, and faith in treatment
Medical student’s disease
medical students incorrectly believe that they have contracted an illness that they have been learning about at one time or another
Mass psychogenic illness
widespread symptom perceptions across individuals (usually through chain reaction) despite tests show that symptoms have no medical basis in their bodies or in the environment
Commonsense models
cognitive representations of illnesses from the ideas and expectations we form about them
4 components of commonsense models
illness identity (name and symptoms): causes and underlying pathology; timeline or prognosis ideas; consequence (seriousness and outcomes)
Lay referral network
non-practitioners (e.g. friends, family) who provide their own information and interpretations regarding a person’s symptoms
What does the lay referral network do?
help interpret a symptom, advice someone to seek medical attention, recommend a remedy, recommend consulting another lay referral person
Who are frequent vs non-frequent users of health services?
children, women, older adults, advantaged groups; men in adolescence or early adulthood, marginalized groups, new immigrants
Iatrogenic conditions
health problems that develop as a result of medical treatment (e.g. wrong type or dose of medication, side effects or risks)
Sanctioning
when someone asks or insists that an ill person have their symptoms treated
Treatment delay
time that elapses between the first time a symptom is noticed and when the person enters medical care
3 stages of treatment delay
appraisal delay, illness delay, utilization delay
Appraisal delay
the time a person takes to interpret a symptom as an indication of illness
Illness delay
the time taken between recognizing one is ill and deciding to seek medical attention
Utilization delay
the time after deciding to seek medical care until actually using the health service or getting treatment
Alternative medicine
any practice that has purported healing effects but is not scientifically based; used in place of medical treatment
Complementary medicine
alternative medicine used in conjunction with conventional medical treatment
Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM)
unconventional treatments either used along with conventional treatments or used in place of them
Types of CAM
manipulative and body-based methods, natural products, mind-body interventions, energy fields, homeopathy, traditional Chinese medicine
Limitation of CAM
they have little to no scientific evidence of their safety and effectiveness in treating specific disorders