Cultural Bound Syndromes ( Cbs )

Nao Kao and Foua had been conflicted with abiding with the Hmong ways to not seek physician help. Certain parts of Hmong culture, such as taboos against procedures, beliefs of disease origins, and power structures within the family and Hmong clan often conflict with western culture of medicine. But when the Lee’s had not taken one of their children to the hospital, his soul was lost, and he died. Considering this incident and their lack of knowledge of Lia’s condition, the Lee’s had to involuntarily comply to western culture and take Lia to the doctors, as their last line of defense. It is important to note here that as a provider, I must be aware of my own assumptions of care. The doctors’ goal of treatment was to use medication and procedures to find out what caused her seizures and treat it with various medications. Lia’s parents considered her disease a blessing as a chance to become a shaman and a curse that caused great stress over the family. This often resulted in misunderstandings between the physicians and the Lee family as the Lee’s perceptions of Lia’s illness were not in line with the doctors.

What happens when two very different or even mutually exclusive cultural perspective are forced into contact with one another? In Anne Fadiman’s The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, there is a division between the shamanistic insubordinate cultural of Hmong refugees in Merced, California and the cold analytical approach of western medicine. In the early 1980s, the child of a Hmong refugee family in Merced, California is born with epilepsy, her name is Lia Lee. Anne Fadiman traces the interaction between these two cultures and Lia’s disease, she reviews that misunderstanding and miscommunication can have calamitous consequences for all involved. The author introduces many characters throughout the book and they all

To better understand possible causes of a culture bound syndrome, the culture should be first understood. Ghost Sickness affects the Navajo people in the western United States. The Navajo believe their people have passed through roughly three worlds before this current one. The “ Holy People ” are being who can either help or harm them. Their medicine men call upon the Holy People by performing rituals that involve singing, dancing, and the use of herbs. Someone with Ghost Sickness would be attempted to

In Hmong culture seizures are not recognized much as a physical illness as it is spiritual in nature and quab dab peg which translates to, the spirit catches you and you fall down, describes the group of symptoms experienced by Lia in the Hmong culture. The Lee’s were both happy and sad about Lia’s seizures. In Hmong culture seizures are considered to have special powers and usually become Shamans, but at the same time the Lees were worried about their child’s health.

“In the Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down”, Anne Fadiman explores the subject of cross cultural misunderstanding. This she effectively portrays using Lia, a Hmong, her medical history, the misunderstandings created by obstacles of communication, the religious background, the battle with modernized medical science and cultural anachronisms. Handling an epileptic child, in a strange land in a manner very unlike the shamanistic animism they were accustomed to, generated many problems for her parents. The author dwells on the radically different cultures to highlight the necessity for medical communities to have an understanding of the immigrants when treating them.

Cultural diversity in the medical field is, at times, greatly hindered because of religious beliefs, language barriers, and the hierarchies of diverse cultures and these have the propensity to affect the continuity of care for the patients. “Every person has different aspects that constitute their identities, according to how they see themselves….This means that seeing an individual in terms of

A person may ask a friend, “What color is this book?” The friend would say the cover is black, but the first person would argue that it is red. The truth is, they are both right. The color of the book depends upon which side of it is exposed to the person. This situation is comparable to the difference in world views. Depending upon which side one looks at a situation, will determine the actions that a person would take. In the story of Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, the relationship between the family of a sick Hmong child, Lia, and Lia’s doctors, Neil and Peggy Ernst, seems to be harder to remedy than Lia’s illness itself. When looking at Lia’s dad, Nao Koa, and one of the main doctors that Lia is treated by, Neil Ernst, the difference in world views are opposite ends of the spectrum. Although Nao Koa and Neil Ernst want the same thing for Lia, their conflicting world views on the nature of life and the purpose of life are the most challenging component of treating Lia’s rare form of epilepsy.

When I began examining specific cross-cultural differences in psychological processes, a particular example that resonated heavily and constantly in my head came from the original article called: Cultural and Educational Influences on Pain of Childbirth by Dr. Matisyohu Weisenberg and Zahava Caspi. In this study the authors examined the effects that educational history and differing sociocultural families of origin have on communicated ratings of pain and specific pain behavior prevalent during childbirth (Weisenberg et al., 1989). On a more elementary level, the authors investigated the disparities in how people verbally and physically react to pain prevalent during childbirth based upon differences in cultural and educational influences.

In this paper I’m going to introduce to you a person who was born in Russia, lived for a short period of time in Romania and now, he is living in the United States. His name is Eugen and me and my husband we met him here, in North Carolina. I will try to highlight what are his values regarding health and illness and how these imply a person and what kind of health practice is unique in Eugen's culture or at least not so popular in the world. I will try to explain how this interview helped me to better understand how to approach my patients, especially those who are coming from different cultures.

People who practice this cultural health belief in Southeastern Asia follows the supernatural/magico/religious health care belief system that is based on the assumption that people live in a world inhabited by supernatural forces (Samovar el at. 2013). The followers of the supernatural/magico/religious health care belief system believe that the negatively omen and evil aurora has an affect on their daily lives comes from sorcery, magic, and evil spirits in addition in which three major cause of illness are supernatural, mental, and psychical. For instance, a painful cramp can be from a low supplement diet but, under the assumption of the supernatural/magico/religious health care belief system, it assumed that the body is unbalanced with nature and in addition, evil forces are invading the body. To expel the evil forces

Our cultures and norms play an enormous role in our lives. Throughout life, everyone has been guided by a belief, which comprises of confidence and faith within a person or something. We come to accept a custom that, something exists and therefore we make it apart of our daily lives. In societies, an entire community or a group of people may share certain beliefs. These common ideas shared between people become a norm or culture that governs the daily socio-active movements of people. In health, culture has a presence and a huge influence on people and their perspective of what is considered healthy. Cultures have systems of beliefs in health by which it justifies the cause of an illness, how to treat the illness and who treats the

Familial CJD (which is inherited) "accounts for about 10-15% of all CJD cases" (Ridley, 3). Other human prion diseases occur only when genetically determined. Gerstmann-Sträussler-Scheinker syndrome (GSS) is one such inherited disease, as is Fatal Familial Insomnia (FFI). Atypical prion disease is also genetically inherited, though it "does not easily fit the various diagnostic criteria for prion disease" (Ridley, 3). Another human prion disease is Kuru, which has been referred to as “the laughing death” (Prusiner). It was an acquired disease (i.e., contracted through contamination) found in the Fore Highlanders of Papua New Guinea. The disease was likely spread by cannibalism, as the Fore honored their dead by eating their brains. However, as this particular ritual stopped, Kuru virtually disappeared (Prusiner).

This can be simply attributed to the fact that adult males seldom participated in the cannibalizing of the dead. In addition to this, when adult males did participate in the mortuary feasts, they often consumed the muscle tissues of the deceased and not the brain, which is the most infectious organ when concerning kuru. Due to the loss of susceptible genotypes and the decline of cannibalistic practices by the Fore people, there were less incidences of Kuru and a decline in kuru mortality rate after the 1950’s. However, kuru-related mortalities, although minute, did persist past this period due to the long incubation time of kuru (mean incubation time ≅12 years). In some cases, patients weren’t afflicted with kuru until 50 years after exposure to the infection.

Cultural practices that inhibit the us of western medicine do not exist solely in Africa. One group of people, The Hmong, have a particular distaste for western medicine. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is an ethnography about a Hmong family’s struggle with trusting modern medicine. Foua Yang and Nao Kao Lee, parents of Lia, a severely epileptic child, strongly believed in traditional Hmong culture and practiced shamanism (Fadiman 1997). Their beliefs and practices clashed with those of western doctors. In shamanism, it is believed that shamans are the only form of communication with the spirit world. The spirit world is seen to have a hand in the lives of the Hmong. When people are sick or any misfortune occurs, they must contact the spirit world through shamans. In the case with Lia, her epilepsy was a sign in the Hmong culture of having spiritual gifts. Seizures are an indicator of future shamans; however, her epilepsy was so severe that when the medical attention she needed was not provided for her, after one epileptic episode she became mentally retarded (Fadiman 1997).

In medical anthropology, there is a unique distinction between the term “illness” and “disease.” Illness is defined as a sociocultural category or perception or experience based on certain socially disvalued states including disease. Disease is defined as a biomedical condition or whether or not they are culturally recognized. An example of illness would be how a culture or society socially views a certain type of disease whereas a disease resembles the biological components of that condition. The reason for this shows how there is a difference between biological aspects of a sickness from the social.