Question 1: What is the significance of birth and death to the professionalization of

medicine?

Professionalizing medicine is described as the course through which the medical field

emerged as a respected profession with a distinct set of knowledge and practice guidelines and

claims to authority in specific domains. This was a fundamental shift in events affirming the

exercise of power and privilege by the medical profession.

According McKinlay and Marceau (2002), with the medical profession improving its

intervention and effectiveness in managing childbirth, it was able to adjust the professional

framework of this art. The hospitals becoming centers of scientific medical treatment provided

an opportunity for doctors to demonstrate their mastery in safely and accurately delivering

babies, thus reducing maternal and infant death rates. The fact that medicine succeeded in

changing a primary lifestyle attribute demonstrates the justified nature of professional claiming

and control over knowledge and power.

Likewise, physicians' role in their decision-making over measures to extend life and the

assessment of death is one of the factors that led to their professionalization. In the wake of the

advancement of medical technology, interventions that specialists could initiate to prolong life

thus influenced the way death could take place and when it could happen (McKinlay & Marceau,

2002). This course gave doctors the power to decide on matters of life and death and helped

legitimize and maintain the professional status of the medical field. Moreover, other factors that

supported medicine professionalization include the state's laws supporting the profession and

funding, the expansion of private health insurance markets, which facilitated more accessible
access to healthcare, and the practical lobbying efforts of medical associations to advance the

interests of the profession.

The profession of medicine obtained a leading position in the medical establishment as it

gained more influence on the processes associated with birth and death and by using scientific

knowledge and the services that determine the interventions for the domains

mentioned. Healthcare professionals emphasized the practical significance of the medical

profession, which strengthened society's trust in it and hence emerged as a well-liked and

influential career.

Question 3: How does the area of palliative medicine fit in the largely interventionist

orientation of the medical profession?

Palliative medicine addresses patients with serious illnesses to ease their suffering and

enhance their quality of life, frequently when curative treatments are no longer suitable or viable.

Unlike the common interventionist culture of medicine, which traditionally highlights aggressive

therapy and remedial measures, holistic medicine is an integrative health approach that

prioritizes the balance between the mind, spirit, and body.

McKinlay and Marceau (2002) notes that the medical profession's historical leaning

toward interventionist methods was motivated by the goal of using various medical procedures

and technological advancements to extend life and treat illnesses. This mindset has sometimes

contradicted the main principles of palliative care, which focus on providing sufficient care to

patients who require it and improving the quality of their living instead of burdening them with

severe treatments.
 The landscape is changing as palliative care has now encompassed many duties

previously ignored in the medical field. However, with the increasing rationality against using

the more aggressive type of treatments, mainly in cases of terminal or advanced diseases and

giving humanitarian concerns and patient desires more heed, the importance of palliative care

approaches is clearly seen in most conditions.

Several obstacles must be overcome to more effectively include palliative medicine in the

practices of the medical community. These policies may include revamping medical training

curricula to include a more comprehensive look at palliative care practices, adopting payment

system models that encourage palliative care approaches, and raising awareness of the need for

palliative medicine among the general public in appropriate conditions (McKinlay & Marceau,

2002).

Although the medical community has always supported an interventionist approach

emphasizing vigorous interventions and curative treatments, palliative care presents a shift

towards a more holistic approach, prioritizing patient comfort and quality of life. With the

medical field still in flux, developing competencies to integrate palliative and interventional parts

in a patient-oriented perspective is in demand.

 Reference

McKinlay, J. B., & Marceau, L. D. (2002). The End of the Golden Age of Doctoring.

International Journal of Health Services, 32(2), 379–416. https://doi.org/10.2190/jl1d-

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