How do traditional Chinese health beliefs and culture influence health and disease?

How do traditional Chinese health beliefs and culture influence health and disease?

Traditional Chinese health beliefs represent a holistic perspective and emphasize the importance of environmental factors when increasing the disease risk. According to Quah (1985), these factors influence the balance of body harmony, Yin and Yang. These are two opposite but complementary forces that together with Qi (life energy) control the universe and explain the relationship between humans and their surroundings. An imbalance of these two forces or the Qi leads to illness.

Traditional healing practices may be necessary to restore balance. For example, excess “hot” energy can be balanced out by cooling herbal teas and vice versa. These beliefs are deeply rooted among the Chinese and have proven to remain unchanged after migrating to Singapore.

Lee, et. Al. (2004) found that patients with certain chronic diseases, namely arthritis, diseases of the musculoskeletal system and stroke, use traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). This was strongly determined by the "chronic disease trias", the perceived satisfaction with care and cultural beliefs on health.

The application of the TCM is therefore not associated with the quality of the doctor-patient interaction. Astin (1998) also agreed that it was considered better with the values, spiritual and religious philosophy or the convictions of patients in terms of nature and importance of health and illness.

In traditional Chinese culture, taking medication is viewed as aversive, so medications are usually only taken until symptoms are relieved and then discontinued. If symptoms are not obvious, medication will probably never be taken.

Apart from the cultural beliefs of the parents, minor side effects can contribute to poor therapy loyalty. The use of "excess", "shared" antibiotics and the over -the -counter purchase of antibiotics by parents are common situations in the community.

They think that their children suffer from the same diseases due to the similar symptoms, so they would give their children the "overlay" or "shared" antibiotics and only bring them to their doctors if there is no improvement (Chang & Tang, 2006). This can lead to their condition deteriorating and later aggressive treatments are necessary that can have unnecessary side effects.

However, there are small groups of Chinese who also blame poor health or misfortune on supernatural forces or divine retribution or the malevolence of a “witch” or “sorcerer” (Helman, 1994). Such groups will usually seek remedies from their religions.

In Singapore, the Ministry of Health has developed the Code of Ethics and Ethical Guidelines for TCM Practitioners to prevent unscrupulous practitioners from taking advantage of their patients and taking advantage of their beliefs, for example to harass unwitting patients.

The degree of acculturation was demonstrated in the following case. An old man was admitted to our hospital with a week -long history of malaise, nausea and vomiting and sudden jaundice. He was diagnosed with an obstructive mass in the liver.

A biopsy resulted in a hepatocellular carcinoma. The serological test indicated chronically active hepatitis B. When his son granted the news that his father had cancer, he asked not to tell his father.

When we spoke about topics at the end of the life such as hospice supply and "do-noteanimates" (DNR) arrangements, the son tried to direct the discussion on other topics, for example when his father could go home.

Cultural issues that may play a role in this case include:

The Chinese tend to protect the elderly from bad news.

Believing in karma - the older people believe that talking about illness or death/dying brings bad luck. They think that talking about something bad will make it come true.

There is an increased incidence of liver cancer due to hepatitis B due to delayed treatment in the elderly as it may take a long time for them to accept the initial diagnosis.

Reference:

Astin yes. (1998). Why use patients alternative medicine. J. Am. Med. Assoc. 1998; 279: 1548-1553.

Chan, GC & Tang, SF (2006) Parental knowledge, attitudes and antibiotic use for acute upper respiratory tract infections in children attending a primary care clinic in Malaysia. Singapore Medical Journal, 47(4):266

Helman, CG (1990) culture, health and illness. Wright, London.

Quah, SR (1985) The health faith model and preventive health behavior in Singapore. Social sciences and medicine, 21, 351-363.

Lee GBW, Charn TC, Chew ZH and NG TP. (2004). The use of complementary and alternative medicine in patients with chronic diseases in primary care is associated with the perceived quality of care and cultural beliefs. Family practice, 21 (6): 654-660.