Role of Medicine and Health Care Professionals

Question 1

How do functionalists view illness?

Answer 1

Deviant - and doctors control this deviance

Question 2

What does Parsons (1951) say about doctors?

Answer 2

Doctors have an important function in society - they control the amount of time people take off work and family duties

Question 3

How is illness deviant?

Answer 3

Disrupts work and home life - you’re not supposed to take time off due to sickness

Question 4

What is the sick role and who introduced it?

Answer 4

• When a person is sick, they’re allowed to stop functioning in their normal role.
• They don’t have responsibility for making themselves better, but are expected to want to get better, and to do whatever the doctor tells them.

Question 5

What do doctors have the power of according to functionalists?

Answer 5

• Have the power to confirm that patient is actually ill
• Allow the sick person to take limited time off, and make them better using expert medical knowledge.

Parsons - always put patient’s needs before their own needs

Question 6

What do critics of Parsons say?

Answer 6

Medical profession don’t always put patients first private medicine is proof of self interest.
However, doctors do give people sick notes so they can take sick leave

Question 7

What do interactionists focus on?

Answer 7

Social interactions between individuals

Question 8

What 3 interactions were found by Szasz and Hollender (1956)?

Answer 8

1) Activity-passivity. Doctor does something to the patient. E.g Operation e.g liver transplant.
2) Guidance/co-operation. Doctor tells a co-operative patient what to do. E.g in acute conditions such as bronchitis.
3) Mutual participation. Doctor helps patient administer self care. E.g chronic conditions like diabetes

Question 9

What do Marxists believe about the medicine profession?

Answer 9

• Institution that supports capitalism
• Keep class inequalities going
• Are in a position of power and have a conservative role in society

Question 10

What are 3 beliefs Marxists have about doctors?

Answer 10

1) Doctors keep the workforce healthy and productive - healthy workers can work harder and won’t have to take time off sick, meaning more profits for capitalist class.
2) Doctors check that workers aren’t spending too much time on sick leave.
3) Doctors hide the real social causes of illness (poverty and class inequality) by focusing on individual and their physical symptoms

Question 11

What do some Marxists think of doctors?

Answer 11

Doctors are agents of large drugs corporations - existing to produce profits for the pharmaceutical industry

Question 12

What is the global pharmaceutical industry and why is it criticised?

Answer 12

Also known as “big pharma”, grew through researching and producing medicines to cure/treat diseases.
Criticised for only wanting to make a profit.

Question 13

What does Law (2006) say about the pharmaceutical industry?

Answer 13

Has too much power:

1) Controlling which illnesses are publicised and researched - these being the ones making them the most money.
- Accused of identifying and promoting new conditions for medicines they already have
2) Hiding drug trial results that show drugs don’t work very well
3) Promoting incentives to doctors to endorse/prescribe products.

Question 14

What has the pharmaceutical industry also been accused of?

Answer 14

Making life-saving drugs too expensive for people who need them

on the other hand, some companies aim to provide free or affordable drugs to developing countries (e.g malaria in Africa)

Question 15

What do feminists say about the medical profession?

Answer 15

It serves patriarchal interests

Question 16

What do feminists say about contraceptive methods?

Answer 16

• Contraceptives are designed for men rather than women

- They have significant health risks for women that men would never put up with

Question 17

what did Oakley (1984) say about childbirth?

Answer 17

• Childbirth has been medicalised.
• Women giving birth are treated like there’s something wrong with them.
• Control over giving birth is taken away from women and given to men.
• Male doctors are often in charge - not midwives or the women giving birth

Question 18

What is women’s role in medicine known as?

Answer 18

• Women tend to have subordinate roles in medicine - nurses and auxiliaries tend to be women while consultants tend to be men.
• Feminists think that role of being a nurse has been made to look as being a “doctor’s handmaid” - female servant obeying male doctor

Question 19

Why is cosmetic surgery criticised by feminists?

Answer 19

Seen as “medicalisation of beauty” and as a social control over women

Question 20

What do feminists believe about diagnoses and treatment of depression in women?

Answer 20

Another kind of social control

Question 21

What do Weberians think about the medical profession?

Answer 21

1) Doctors arrange things so that they keep power and high status in society
2) Suggest that medical profession is self-serving, and that it has shut out other forms of healing such as homeopathy/aromatherapy and other types of modern medicine
3) This gives modern medicine a monopoly

Question 22

What do postmodernists believe about medical professionals?

Answer 22

Disagree with other sociological views - believe power of the medical profession has reduced

Question 23

How do postmodernists believe that medical professionals have lost power?

Answer 23

• Doctors traditionally held all medical knowledge, giving them power.
• Postmodernists believe this has changed through the internet allowing people to empower themselves by doing their own research and self-diagnosing.
• Doctors complain that this misinforms patients, causing unnecessary worry and leading them to demand inappropriate treatments.

Question 24

What do postmodernists believe about healthcare and society?

Answer 24

Health care is now part of a consumerist society e.g patients can choose where to be treated based on mortality rates, and can also pick from a range of complementary and alternative treatments e.g acupuncture

Question 25

What do postmodernists believe about society and health?

Answer 25

• Society has become medicalised, and normal life changes such as menopause and old age are treated as medical conditions.
• This transfers power from health professionals to drug companies (who advertise products as wonder cures) and to the patient consumers.