Sociology is a comprehensive area of study. It blends with healthcare in many platforms as will be seen in the paper. Different authors have defined sociology while considering the characteristics and components attributed to it. The best definition is that it is the study of the behavior of individuals in their environment and how they relate with other individuals (Althouse, West, Bergstrom, & Bergstrom 2009).
It is important to cover the growth and structure of human beings behavior in order to understand sociology. Healthcare is defined as the use of medicine in order to treat and cure the physical body of a human being. Healthcare is used to stop or reduce pain on an individual (Amin, &Mabe 2010). This paper will highlight the role of sociology in healthcare and while use selected theories of sociology to extrapolate on the determinants of health while still addressing the biomedical model.
Role of sociology in healthcare
The role of sociology in healthcare addresses the relation between the two. There are institutions that contribute to the society and are key to understanding how they impact healthcare. While citing education as one of the key components, significant low levels of illiteracy in a community will lead to poor healthcare. On the other hand, high levels of literacy in a society will lead to creating significant change in increasing and providing better health care to the society (Bergstrom, 2017).
Culture should be highlighted in the determination of healthcare of a community. Archaic cultural practices like the marrying off of teenage girls where they give birth to children causing death at childbirth should not be encouraged. In some communities, practices like the circumcision of boys using the same blade are still practiced. This may lead to an increase in infections and may also spread terminal diseases like HIV which was not there in the past. Different geographical areas have different factors that lead to the assessment of healthcare (Anderson, Smith, &Sidel 2015). This paper will incorporate all these factors and how they reflect while focusing on sociology and healthcare.
Sociological theories
Conflict theory talks of the inherent nature of humans to embrace disagreements that are either nonviolent or violent. Human beings tend to focus more on the structure of the society and how they can selfishly protect their interests while exploiting those of others. In ancient times, wars were caused by systems committing injustices to its people. These led to uprisings and movements where these conflicted areas witnessed the loss of life. This theory shows how daily disagreements lead to conflict and how it impacts people’s life (Braun, Glänzel, & Schubert 2016). The wealthy still control vast resources that are needed by the poor such as basic needs, food shelter, and clothing.
Another theory is the feminism theory which assists in highlighting the plight of women in the society. Women are seen as the weaker species and they are therefore treated as a lesser species than men. This view of women, therefore, leads to them being highly discriminated against in many aspects of life. This theory aims to correct that and fight for the equality between both genders. It aims to speak on these shortcomings and highlight them by starting at the tender age when a girl is born to her old age (Banks, &Dellavalle, 2008).
In some societies and communities, women were viewed as part of the man’s property. In these patriarchal societies, the woman’s only responsibility was to give birth and take care of the children. In extreme cases, they were even sold to the highest bidder and exchanged for animals in the name of a bride price. They were then married off to men twice or even thrice their age. Feminism corrects that.
Feminism theory explains how gender relates to power and prestige and is almost similar to the conflict theory. This however only highlights the plight of gender in the society. It explains the patriarchal dominance of men in the society and the discrimination of women as the weaker gender in all aspects. Women here are discriminated deeply due to their gender. However other forms of feminism have come up, for example, the black feminism which highlights the issues faced by black women (Anderson, Smith, &Sidel 2015).
Feminism is also influenced by a few social determinants that ultimately influence health. Addressing the issue of education, it is important to note that some communities do not give priority to the education of girls. While girls are given a little education because they will get married off, boys are educated to university levels. Such discrimination is retrogressive to the society and affects health directly (Arendt, 2010). Knowledge of how to prevent illnesses especially for the woman is crucial.
The relationship between sociological theories and social determinants of health
The two social theories are directly and indirectly related to the determinants of health. Beginning with feminism, the woman is important in ensuring that health care is of the family is optimal. A woman is the caretaker of children from the time they are born to when they mature as grownups.
The household hygiene completely relies on the woman. Hygiene directly relates to healthcare. Feminism fights for the education of the woman. This, therefore, means an educated woman is a better mother to her children with reference to healthcare than an uneducated woman (Berkman, Glass, Brissette, &Seeman 2010). An educated mother will pay for insurance for her children to hospitals that can give them better healthcare.
She knows that medical checkups for her children for example dental checkups are important. She is also in a position to provide better housing for her children where they can be free of the cold and rain so as not to contact flu and/or pneumonia. Women who are not educated cannot provide such basic necessities for their families. Creating awareness is therefore important in bettering health care.
This theory also highlights the importance of considering women for better positions (Garfield, 2016). This means that jobs that are advertised in managerial capacities either in government or non-governmental organizations should be made available to women. When they get these positions, they are in a better place to understand the plight of their fellow women and what they need to implement. An example is the health policies that can stop mother to child transmissions.
Conflict theory also directly influences health care. The wealthy are seen to take all the resources leaving the poor to scatter for the remaining resources. In healthcare, better hospitals are attended to by the wealthy. The poor do not get better health services due to their lack of affordability. In conflicted areas, it is even difficult to set infrastructure such as roads to access hospitals. In other cases funds are not available for the construction of these facilities or to buy equipment needed (Franceschet, 2010). Cases, where diseases need referral hospitals in conflict-prone areas, may lead to deaths of the patients. Medicine is afforded by the wealthy that have the financial capacity to buy them. This theory highlights the importance of staffing qualified doctors and nurses.
Biomedical Model
This model takes a different perspective. It focuses only on using biological processes in ensuring that the body has attained its full recovery. The use of medicine is highly used as the only way while not considering other external factors (Harzing, & Van Der Wal 2009). This, therefore, is fully in reliance on the medical experts to make sure that the body has recovered. This model covers the process. These experts have attended educational training on how to deal with the human body.
This model is seen as different from the sociological perspectives. It is however efficient due to previous research from known scholars in different fields of medicine. Results also show that most patients who have followed the prescriptions given have ended up being free of the diseases that they were suffering from. This model, however, has its setbacks. If a patient suffered from cholera and was treated but still went back to the same environment where he/she got cholera from, it is more likely that re-contamination may occur(Garfield, 2016). Despite the model curing the disease, it does not solve the underlying problems that are causing the illness. Societal factors like proper housing, hygiene, sanitation and clean water are still the underpinning factors for better health.
Using their years of knowledge, they use this knowledge to treat. This model does not consider sociological theories as important in determining the healthcare situation. Whereas, from the literature above on sociological theories; we have seen the importance of them in healthcare. Using an example, we can see that the steps of diagnosis where there is a step to step medicinal process to make sure that the patient has recovered. This model is also seen as the leading model since it has been tried for a very long time and it is still ongoing. It has been used to achieve full recovery and mostly the highest reliable model. Every time an individual falls sick they seek the consultation services of a medical practitioner. (Hodge, &Lacasse, 2011). This model has grown in the discoveries of new medicine and drugs to face the challenges in healthcare.
Conclusion
This paper shows that the sociological theories and determinants assist in influencing healthcare. The biomedical model is also important in that the diagnosis of the patient helps in figuring out the problem and solving it. Both theories and models should be used together to realize full healthcare.
References
Althouse, B. M., West, J. D., Bergstrom, C. T., & Bergstrom, T. (2009). Differences in impact factor across fields and over time. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and technology, 60(1), 27-34.
Amin, M., &Mabe, M. (2010). Impact factors: use and abuse. International Journal of Environment Science and Technology, 1(1), 1-6.
Anderson, M. R., Smith, L., &Sidel, V. W. (2015). What is social medicine. Monthly Review, 56(8), 27-34.
Arendt, J. (2010). Are article influence scores comparable across scientific fields. Issues in Science and Technology Librarianship, 60(4), 1-10.
Banks, M. A., &Dellavalle, R. (2008).Emerging alternatives to the impact factor. OCLC Systems & Services: International digital library perspectives, 24(3), 167-173.
Bergstrom, C. (2017). Eigenfactor: Measuring the value and prestige of scholarly journals. College & Research Libraries News, 68(5), 314-316.
Berkman, L. F., Glass, T., Brissette, I., &Seeman, T. E. (2010). From social integration to health: Durkheim in the new millennium?. Social science & medicine, 51(6), 843-857.
Braun, T., Glänzel, W., & Schubert, A. (2016).A Hirsch-type index for journals. Scientometrics, 69(1), 169-173.
Franceschet, M. (2010).Ten good reasons to use the Eigenfactor™ metrics. Information Processing & Management, 46(5), 555-558.
Garfield, E. (2016). The history and meaning of the journal impact factor. Jama, 295(1), 90-93.
Harzing, A. W., & Van Der Wal, R. (2009). A Google Scholar h?index for journals: An alternative metric to measure journal impact in economics and business. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and technology, 60(1), 41-46.
Hodge, D. R., &Lacasse, J. R. (2011). Evaluating journal quality: Is the H-index a better measure than impact factors?. Research on Social Work Practice, 21(2), 222-230.
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