Advantages of Medical Anthropology, Book Review Example

There are many critical issues and concepts under the umbrella of medical anthropology, but the most important advantage to utilizing medical anthropology is a commitment to applying medical anthropology.  The author of the text examined multiple advantages for the field, but the greatest advantage that it can actually provide to the medical field and the general public at home and abroad is through its application.  Throughout the text, the author has included many important discussions of how medical anthropology can be applied.  There was a complex discussion that involved how bioethics and cultural awareness are important factors that medical anthropologists must utilize in this field.  The importance of medical anthropology to the medical field is vast and must be understood in order to examine exactly where it falls into the grand scheme and can be utilized to achieve great accomplishments not only for the medical field but for the public as well.

There are many reasons that medical anthropology and its application should be closely considered and utilized as an advantageous factor in the medical field.  Joralemon wrote that “Anthropology has a contribution to make to the alleviation of human suffering, whether it be through its incorporation into the training and practice of medical professionals or by the critique it offers of ill-conceived programs at home and abroad” (132).  Therefore, the training and actual practice of medical professionals should be analyzed, critiqued and evaluated based on the multiple views and considerations that are only prevalent in medical anthropology.  It has only been recently true that the medical field and medical practitioners are being educated to become culturally aware in order to improve the quality of medical care that is being provided to the general public.  The growing diversity in the United States and the outbreak of globalization has forced a multi-cultural population that includes multiple religious views about proper health care and physical or social treatment as well as linguistic differences.  Medical anthropologists are well aware of these changes and must utilize their knowledge to help educate medical professionals so that communication and patient treatment can improve.  The days of a white male doctor providing the same care to all patients are over.  Care must be adjusted based on the views and components found only through the study of medical anthropology.

This fourth advantage that Joralemon has discussed is the most important advantage because it actually provides an all-inclusive option of the three other advantages.  Joralemon wrote that the other three advantages were sensitivity for culture and biology; recognition that the political economy has health implications; and insistence on the value of ethnography (131).  Each of these is combined into the actual application of medical anthropology.  Through these three advantages, medical anthropologists can utilize these viewpoints to conduct research and analyses.  However, this does nothing to contribute to “alleviating human suffering” if the research and analyses are not actually applied to the medical field.  It is the responsibility of medical anthropologists to take this information and research and utilize all resources necessary to ensure that medical practitioners actually apply it to improve the quality of health care, improved communication and use of bioethical and applications-based debate.  These actions are not only useful to alleviating human suffering, but they are morally, culturally and professional demanded of all medical anthropologists in the profession.  The work and considerations performed within medical anthropology can only have true value to eliminating cholera, Swine Flu or AIDS epidemics when the methods we have learned are actually applied to the medical field.

References

Joralemon, Donald. Exploring Medical Anthropology. 3rd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2010. Print.