Health sociology

• Disease is PHYSICAL
• Doctors are ELITE
• Medicine is a CURE
• Illness is TEMPORARY
• Treatment is SPECIAL

They have the ability and knowledge to treat and cure illnesses - saving lives

The working class

• Cultural 
• Social
• Artefact
• Structural

Those who need health care the most - receive the poorest kind.

• Married women
• Afro-Carribean people
• Working class
• Women (in comparison to men)

A social construct that doesn't really exist

Illich believes it is when the medical elite cause illness rather than cure it

• side effects.

• Clinical - ineffective diagnosis
• Social - medicalisation of social life
• Cultural - destruction of people's ways of coping

The elimination of disease because of the improvment of medicine.

e.g. small pox

Health has improved because of:

• better public hygiene 
• Better diets
• Declining of family size
• Housing legislation

• Some people are to blame for their illness
• Some people go to work ill
• There are new alternative therapies
• Gives too much power to doctors

• Pregnancy is seen as a health problem treated in a hospital
• Women tend to be nurses and men doctors - doctors get paid more.
• Contraception is aimed at women

• Ensure workers remain healthy 
  a healthy worker is a productive worker
• Keep companies afloat
  pharmaceuticals
  tobacco
  alcohol 

When your residence determines the quality and availability of the NHS services.

• Doctors set up practices in upper-class areas 
• Middle class patients are given more time
• Middle class people know how to interact with doctors easier
• Middle class have more flexible jobs and transport

• Women are socialized to be expressive of their emotions
• Women are more in tune with health issues (magazines)
• Women have more convenient working hours
• Women are more stereo-typically vulnerable  

• Ethnic minorities use NHS less often
• Poorer language skills
  lack of translation
• religion
  women not willing to be treated by men doctors
• Socio-economic background 

• Women over the age of 65 are not invited to breast screening
  over 3/4 of deaths by breast cancer are of this age group
• 1/5 of heart units operate on age policy
• Clinical trials mainly exclude the elderly.  

Not listening to someone because you do not agree with what they are saying

• Gender - women are more likely to be diagnosed with mental illness - more so depression and men schizophrenia.
• Ethnicity - Afro-Caribbeans are more likely to be diagnosed with schizophrenia.
• Social class - poorer people are more likely to be diagnosed with a mental illness.
• Age - the elderly are more likely to accept a mental illness and so accept and live by the label. 

Found there was a clear health gap between working and middle classes. 

• Underclass are of worse health than upper class 
• There are less underclass so the difference isn't that clear

Health influences social class
- unable to maintain a job 

Working class lead a different lifestyle to the middle-class

• diet
• exercise
• smoking
• stress

Blames society for low income, poor housing and poor working conditions.

• Women have the triple shift
• Women are subjected to poverty more - single mother.

• Seek medical help more
• Drink and smoke less
• Less dangerous jobs
• Men take more risks 
  sports
  jobs
  alcohol 

• Biological 
  high blood pressure
  sickle cell anemia
• Cultural
  Use of different cooking oils and eating habits
• Materialistic
  socio-economic factors - living conditions
• Racism during diagnosis 

A form of social control, by there being rights and obligations that a sick person is expected to get.