The Practice Of Coin Rubbing

In the Dominican culture, when it comes to illness and health, there is no real explanation as to why people get sick. Some believe illness is caused by natural factors such as a dysfunction in the body; others believe illness is due to supernatural causes such as punishment from evil ancestral spirits or somebody sends the evil spirits after them to harm them. When asked about views of health and illness, she stated that most Dominicans interpret health as being up, active and not being in bed where one is unable to take care of his or her self. Many Dominicans believe that if you are not in bed, therefore you are healthy. Many Dominicans believe in folk practice to promote health, for example: a problems that are seen as natural and spiritual are treated with prayer and ritual. Problems that are believed to be supernatural are treated with the help of a witch, healer, or a voodoo priest. For instance, the Catholics practice Spiritism and Santeria by praying the saints to grant them favors and heal them. Some may consult a healer who usually enters in contact with the saint spiritually to ask the saints

This perspective is harmful to patients in some ways. Specialists often just look inside their own parameter and do not consider other factors might be influencing illness. On the other hand, A Navajo healer will look for the imbalance. To a hataalii it is clear that everything affects everything else. The stress from disharmony can cause physical sickness, depression, even violence and death. . She said, “The Navajo view is macro view, whereas Western Medicine often takes a micro view” (Alvord, 1999, pg. 187). Thus she suggested that a doctor should no only cure but also heal by considering all factors in a patient’s life through holistic patient

Many traditional Native medicines and healing practices were discouraged with the advent of Western medicine, but now there is a movement to return to traditional ways (Zubek, 1994, p. 1924). Modern Western medicine treats the symptoms to cure a diseased state when the body is out of homeostasis. Native American healing traditions do this as well with herbs and plants suited to the purpose. These Native healing traditions also include sacred rituals, chants, and purification rites to help bring the spirit and mind of the afflicted back into balance. In effect, treating the whole person, not only the disease. A blending of these two healing practices could bring about better prognoses for today's patients. The purpose of this paper is

These religious and spiritual influences play a major role in the Hispanics health, illness and daily life. In much a similar manner, the Native American Indian family adopts the cultural beliefs to associate with illness and health. They believe that a person’s state of exists when he or she exists in harmony with nature and sickness occurs when an imbalance between the natural or supernatural forces and the sick individual exists (Askim-Lovseth & Aldana, 2010). Traditional health believes and practices involving healing ceremonies and rituals restore balance when illness happens. “These can be conducted by their traditional medicine men or women, who are thought to have compelling powers, the ability to read minds, and know-how in concocting medicine, drugs and poisons.” For the white young family, the cultural belief of invincibility and youth are the driving force behind health prevention (Askim-Lovseth & Aldana, 2010). “Focus on the temporary is regularised, while thinking about health is assigned to an adult person where family accountabilities pertain.” Protecting against illness or disease does not feature into their daily lives. Disease or illness is something that is insubstantial and distant, and unimaginable to their young, resilient bodies and thus irrelevant (Edelman & Mandle, 2010).

Not only family, but spiritualism is used for health promotion by prayer for the ill and dying (Edelman, Kudzma, & Mandle, 2014). Hot and cold imbalances, magic, spiritual discipline, disturbance of internal organs, and mental and emotional problems are thought to be the cause of sickness and bad health (Edelman, Kudzma, & Mandle, 2014). The theory of hot and cold directs Latinos to choose applicable treatment (Edelman, Kudzma, & Mandle, 2014). To demonstrate, warm liquids are used for an individual with a cold, and child liquids are used for an individual with a fever (Edelman, Kudzma, & Mandle, 2014).

Traditional Cherokee medicine primarily focuses on the purity and wellbeing of the soul and assesses the physiological condition of the body as a secondary practice (Frazier, Goad, & Wolyniak, 2013). The Cherokee highly value the importance of man being in a harmonious balance with nature. An imbalance in nature is the theory behind the causation of disease. Cherokee perform various rituals and sacred prayers to maintain a balance its nature and to protect themselves from harm and disease caused by evil spirits. Most Native American theories are learned by means of prayer, visions, dreams or divination (Putsch , 1990). After the United States federal government broke solemn promises to protect Native Americans’s rights in the past, Native Americans

In ‘The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down’, Lia, a Hmong baby girl, is born to a Hmong family living in California as refugees away from their war torn land in Laos. In Laos the Lee’s where farmers and lived in the country according to their Hmong traditions and beliefs. In California they barely understood the language, much less Western culture or medicinal practices. In Hmong tradition, illness was seen as a spiritual problem rather than a physical problem and a Shaman that practiced spiritual ceremonies and used natural remedies was sought to prevent or cure certain illnesses and/or diseases; so when Lia suffered her first seizure at the age of 3 months and was taken to Mercer

On the other hand, western medicine doctors diagnose the problem by observing the physical symptoms, screening the blood, and perform various other medical techniques that rely on advanced medical education and training. Doctors are concerned with the physical symptoms and disregard the “soul” which in turn conflicts with the Hmong culture because they believe in souls and higher mental processes. Fadiman’s proved that the central argument was the collision between the Hmong culture and the physical disease treatment of western medicine.

Native American traditional medicine and spiritual healing rituals go back for thousands of years, these traditions often focus on different variations of alternative medicine. This knowledge is passed on throughout generations, many of the tribes learn that by mixing natural plants such as herbs and roots they can make remedies with healing properties. It is believed that being healthy is when people reach a state of harmony not only spiritually, mentally but physically. To be able to overcome the forces that cause illness people must “operate in the context of relationship to four constructs —namely, spirituality (Creator, Mother Earth, Great Father); community (family, clan, tribe/nation); environment (daily life, nature, balance); and self (inner passions and peace, thoughts, and values)” (Portman & Garret, 2006, p.453). In this research paper I am going to show evidence of the tremendous influence that Native American medicine and spiritual healing have over modern medicine in the course of healing

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is a piece of journalism that demonstrates the clash between western medical practices and that of the Hmong culture. Both the physicians and Lia’s family are trying to do their best to improve Lia’s medical condition but the two cultures’ idea of treating her epilepsy contradict each others. Additionally, western medical culture and Hmong culture have different definitions for Lia’s illness. The western definition of her illness is epilepsy meaning a disruption of the electrical signals in the brain and the Hmong definition of epilepsy is soul exiting the body. As a western reader through the emersion in your culture you are subjective to have the opinion that the western way for handling epilepsy is the right way and from the Hmong perspective they are naturally subjective to think that the Hmong way of handling the epilepsy is the best way. There is not a clear answer to which way is the right way to handle Lia’s medical situation without being bias of your own culture. Not one way of medicine is better than the other, they are just different. The Hmong definition of medicine is takes a more personal holistic and spiritual approach in contrast to the westerner’s definition having an objective scientific approach. Although we cannot conclude which way of handling Lia’s medical situation is clearly the right way the one thing that is certain is that the two different cultures disrupt each other’s care for Lia. Fadiman’s journal on

In this case study on cross cultural medicinal beliefs and practices, Anne Fadiman addresses the rift between Hmong spiritual and medicinal customs and the culture of American biomedicine by telling the story of a young Hmong child, Lia Lee. Lia’s journey started when she was three months old and she suffered her first of many epileptic seizures. Over the next few months she continued to suffer from her seizures and made at least three emergency room visits. Like most cases of epilepsy, the cause of her grand mal seizures was unknown, however, her parents, Nao Kao and Foua Lee, believed it to be the result of her elder sister slamming the door and scaring Lia awake, allowing a dab, or evil spirit, to steal her soul. After her first visit to the Merced Community Medical Center, it became clear that the language barrier would not allow for an accurate patient history to be recorded. As Lia’s condition worsened, this barrier would further prevent the Lee’s from understanding exactly what was happening to their daughter as well as follow the treatment the doctors were implementing. This eventually lead to the doctor’s believing that Nao Kao and Foua

The third interview conducted was with a Chinese family (The Wang’s). The Wang family consists of the parents and 2 children that all play an active role in Buddhism. The Wang’s were all born in Chengdu, China and migrated to the United States 5 years ago. The Wang’s primary language is Mandarin. The father and two children also speak English. The Wang family doesn’t communicate much with their extended family. All extended family still reside in Chengdu, China. The Wang family is very private when dealing with or talking about their health. They express no current health concerns. The Wang family maintains good health through eating healthy; they eat large amounts of vegetables rice and fish. The Wang family uses health protection by positive thinking, and meditation. The Wang’s also state that they see a physician on a regular basis for check ups. As far as interviewing The Wang’s it was difficult to obtain specific information on their past or current health beliefs. The Wang’s appeared to be a private family (Wang, 2013).

Native Americans believe that people can get ill from an imbalanced life or diseases (Schwing, 2008). Lori had seen this many times with her patients in the hospital. When the people in the operating room were not balance with themselves and each other Lori noticed that the patients had rougher recoveries. Once she started to notice this she

Families around the world all have different beliefs and religions that they follow. Some move to America just so they can give their families a better life, but that doesn’t mean that they leave behind the traditions that they followed. It just makes it difficult sometimes for them adjusting to the American ways compared to how they were used too back in their country. Especially when it comes down to how people get sick and how they are treated so that they can get better. Here we discuss about the Hmong culture and how there’s a difference with how they heal people compared to how it’s done in America. Healing someone can be through medicine or any type of treatment from some kind of doctor or as the Hmong heal, they use a shaman. A shaman is a person with a

Every culture has its own views of health care, diseases, and medical interventions. The way people of a given culture view health care affects how they handle themselves when they fall ill. For instance, the Asian culture believes that illnesses are caused by supernatural phenomena, which should be diagnosed and treated by means of spiritual healing or traditional herbs. Physicians and other medical practitioners should try to understand the cultural beliefs of their patients to handle them appropriately.