Integrating Perspectives On Health

This textbook is designed for health studies students and those undertaking training in the health professions, particularly those who are taught about health and disease in terms of biological, psychological and social factors. These three ways of understanding health are often regarded as offering an holistic approach, but they differ greatly in the way they explain health related issues. This book examines the difficulties of applying the three perspectives together in practice. Drawing on first-hand accounts of professionals from a diverse range of health fields, the tensions within the biopsychosocial model are explored. Part one includes chapters on health visiting, nursing, mental health teams and child protection. Part two examines the challenge to professional models from lay views of child abuse, health promotion, complementary therapies and bereavement. The final section reviews attempts to develop an holistic approach to health through the integration of perspectives, both in research and in practice.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements Preface The biopsychosocial model Part one: Professional perspectives and practice Health visiting a profession for all seasons Nursing biopsychosocial care? Negotiating boundaries reconciling differences in mental health teamwork Multidisciplinary child protection and interdisciplinary perspectives on child abuse and neglect Part two: Lay perspectives Lay understandings on child abuse and neglect utilizing explanations Health promotion and lay health beliefs Cancer care conventional, complementary or consensus The social construction of grief Part three: Towards integration Health research Holistic thinking personhood and the biopsychosocial model A reconciling framework References Index

Review :
"For a long time both practitioners and scholars have beenlooking for a really good text which writes about recent theory, explains it well and then goes on to examine its impact upon practice. With this book they might have found it! the contributors have not been timid - they have 'taken on' the complexities of social constructionisttheorising and have tackled a range of topical areas which are difficult and demanding - from cancer care to child abuse. But this is done in an accessible and readable manner and the various parts are thoughtfully and systematically put together . This book will be invaluable for students, for health practitioners and for their teachers - indeed,anyone concerned to gain a better understanding of the way health care - in its widest sense - is going." - Wendy Stainton Rogers (Open University) "The editors and contributors shouldbe congratulated, as they have addressed an issue - the biopsychosocial model of health - that has great contemporary significance for health studies students." - Nursing Times