Week 2: Illness and Health Care

Health: A state of complete physical, mental, and social well being definition for health

1. Four main concerns of sociologists

a. Impact of social forces
b. Distribution of effects (everyone felt the effect differently) (ex. If your house is
paid off you're not worrying about interest rates going up)
c. Impact on the individuals and others
i. Self-identiy
ii. Relationships
d. Health care systems
2. Four reason why health and illness are social problems
a. Multiple people are affected
b. Illnesses are unequally distributed (ex. You’re stressing about life, money for
food and buses)
c. Health care inadequacies-unequally affect some social group s
d. Some problems affect everyone (ex. shortages of nurses)
3. The global context: patterns of health and disease
a. Epidemiology (The study of the patterns of health and disease)- incorporates
multiples areas ex. Public health, medicine, biology, and sociology/ an
epidemeolgist is a scientist who studies the social origins and distribution of
health problems in a population and how patterns of illness and disease vary
between and within societies
b. Patterns of morbidity (the presence of one or more disorders/ the amount of
disease, impairment or accidents within a population)
i. Refers to acute (something you have to deal with now) and chronic
(diabetes, hypertension) illness and the symptoms they produce/
prevalence (how often does it happen)/ incidence (numbers of new
cases within a specific period)
ii. They vary according to social factors such as social class, education,
sex, race, a society’s level of development, the age structure of the
population, exacerbated by anabolic bacteria (we give out so many
anti-biotics its a problem/ heart disease, cancer increasing, mental
disorders, and respitory diseases
c. Patterns of longevity (why do some people live longer?)
d. Patterns of mortality
i. Cardiovascular and diseases 76.4 % of diseases in deaths since 09
ii. Infancy and childhood mortality rates
1. 4.78/1000- infant mortality rate for every 1000 boys 5.11, girls
4.43
2. In the world approximately 12 million children under 5 die each
year- most live in developing countries; more than half are due
to diarrhea,(dehydration), acute respiratory, measles; all
available and treatable with low costs (preventative )
3. Maternal mortality rate: the disparity is very great between rich
and poor womens
4. 3 most common causes of maternal mortality
 a. If something happens from the placenta
(haemorrhages)
b. Infection
c. Complications arising from unsafe abortions
d. Canada has a very low maternal mortality rate
e. Maternal deaths are linked to women's low status in
society and their lack of decsion making ability and
economic power
4. Hive/aids in Canada
a. More than 34 million peopel in the world are living with hiv and aids in the
world/ 23.5 million in sub saharan Africa, and 4.3 million in Asia,
predominantly it was heterosexual contact, second to parental transaction
b. First case diagnosed in 1982; there were more men then women who were
diagnosed/ but rates are rising amount women (heterosexual contact with
high risk partners and injection with drugs)
c. Prior to 1994, only 6.8 % were adult females; was over 15; it has risen to over
20% over the past two years/ most striking 15-29 aids diagnoses, proportion
of aid diagnoses that is attributable to females has increased from 9.9%
before 1994 to 2004 45%
5. Epidemiological Transition
a. Ideally you want to live longer and be healthy/ you either have short life but
chronic diseases or old but have other diseases (we expect to see an
increase in chronic and degenerative diseases)
b. Parasitic : cholera, salmonella, tuberculosis, diphtheria, moping cough, small
pox, hepatitis and polio
c. High life expectancy ; high prevalence of chronic and degenerative diseases
d. Low life expectancy:
6. Mental health: the invisible epidemic
a. Specific criteria that looks at the level of intensity
b. The DSM and related medical documents relating to mental/perceptual
difference has been criticized for its potential damaging impact on peoples
day to day self perception
7. Extent and impact of mental illness
a. 70% of all cases of mental illness the initial onset; the earlier the onset the
worse it is or the more concerning it is; most show up before or during
adolescence/ more men experience it addition, and more women seeking
treatment for mood and anxiety disorders
b. Canadians in the lowest income group are 3 to 4 times more likely to report
fair to poor mental health than those in the highest income group
c. Studies in various Canadian cities have between 23% and 67% of homeless
people report having a mental illness
8. Causes of mental disorders
a. Biological, psychological and social (there are triggers that can alter certain
disorders, environmental factors: poverty, history of abuse: sexual abuse of
children changes the brain structure)
9. Sociological theories of illness and healthcare
a. Structural-functionalist perspective
 i. Illness, health, and health care affect and are affected by changes in
other aspects of social life
ii. These theories belive that increased modernization and
industrialization, have increased environmental pollution- and that has
effects on healthcare; they also argue that gender expectations play a
role, the idea that men frequently ignore health issues and are less
likely to go to the doctor, women are sometimes forced to go to the
doctor, women are influenced by social demands, and also delay due
to social demands (school) (this in turn places women and infants at
greater risk)
iii. Globalization: increased travel and tourism has increased
transmission of diseases
b. Conflict perspective
i. Improved sanitation systems and proper housing would greatly affect
healthcare, as well as immunizations and anti-biopics have virtually
eliminated infectious diseases;/ not all Canadians have benefited
equally, some Canadians live in crowded conditions and have poor
nutrition, thing of aboriginal Canadians.
1. Aboriginals are more susceptible of TB infection
2. 4% of Canadian population, 21% of all tuberculous
3. Malaria kills twice as many people per year as does aids/
every year the us spends and gives funding for malaria/ 358.8
million to treat malaria
4. Feminist perspective: gender influences all aspects of life, tied
to class, race, ethnicity, age; linked to sociology-economic
status and has an impact on health; breast and reproductive
cancers are affected by here a women lives, what her
educational background i, and what access she has to medical
care/ all factors combined influence the risk to develop cancer
and how early the cancer will be detected, the kind of
treatment she will receive, and ultimately her chances of
survival
10. Symbolic interaction
a. Goldstein argues there are no illnesses in nature, there are only conditions
that groups within it have come to define as illness or disease
b. Thomas Szasz (1961/1970) what we call mental illness is no more than a
label on those individuals who are different that is who do not conform to
society’s definition of appropriate behaviour
i. They use the example of being fat or obese; this means different
things in different societies
11. Social factors associated with health and illness
a. Social class and poverty
b. Education (can pull an individual right out of poverty)
i. Bottom line, more education more options
ii. Less educated are more liekly to engage in health-risk behaviours of
smoking and heavy drinking
iii. Less educated women are less likely to seek prenatal care, more
likely to smoke during pregnancy
 c. Gender
i. Weitz said that in sum women live longer than men but experience
more illness, where men experience relatively little illness but they die
quickly when they do get sick
ii. Men are more prone to smoke, use alcohol and take illegal drugs, and
to work under hazardous conditions- the argument is that they have
been socialized to be aggressive, competitive and more liekly to
engage in risky behaviour ; in fact the suicide rate for Canadian men is
about 3.8 suicides for every 1 female, men are more liekly use more
successful methods
iii. Underuse of services, stigma surrounding what real men do/ do not do
d. Racial and ethnic minority status
i. Aboriginal people live on average 7 years less
ii. Alcohol related deaths in aboriginal Canadians is 4-9 times higher;
psychiatric hospital rates 50% higher.
12. Social class and poverty
a. Poverty
i. World's leading health problem (children do not have enough food)