Bio-Medical Model of Health

771 Words4 Pages
Health can be approached in various different ways, whether through treating an individual’s ailment but not taking a further interest in investigating what is causing the individual’s symptoms and thus missing the opportunity to prevent the individual from suffering from the ailment again (for example, if an individual went into rehabilitation for a drink or drug issue and was treated for their addiction but was later sent back into the same environment, they are likely to relapse) or through addressing the sociological causes of the illness (for example, removing an individual with drug issues from an environment that they can get drugs and instead moving them to somewhere that they will be unable to get drugs which will then give them a better chance at staying rehabilitated). According to Whitbeck (1981) health is ‘the capacity to act or respond appropriately in a wide variety of situations’ which means that in order to be healthy individuals need to be able to meet the demands that the environment and the individuals that are within that environment make of them. The Bio-Medical model of health is an approach that believes that health is the absence of disease and that with correct medical intervention and treatment to eliminate the disease that good health will return. This means that for an individual to have good health that a medical diagnosis is needed to make sure that the individual will receive the correct medical treatment, usually in the form of medication or some form of therapy (physiotherapy, psychotherapy, etc.). According to the Bio-Medical model of health, an individual and their environment have no control over their illness and it is an entirely physical reason for an individual being ill as there is no link between the mind and body whatsoever. It would be easy to argue against this due to the existence of illnesses that show a distinct link
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