Year: 2013
Type: article
Abstract: Pain has risen to epidemic levels in the United States, and how we as physicians manage it best has become a widely debated issue. More than 100 million American adults suffer from chronic pain [1], the financial implications of which are astounding. It is estimated that the direct cost of pain treatment is around $300 billion dollars annually. That is more than treatment for cancer and diabetes combined [2]. Joint pain alone is responsible for 12.5 million emergency department and clinic visits annually [1]. While pain management has become an issue that physicians deal with on a daily basis, there is not yet consensus on how best to address it. In “Problems of Quality and Equity in Pain Management, ” Crowley-Matoka et al. identify three elements of biomedical culture that contribute to the current problems in managing pain: (1) mind-body dualism; (2) a distinction between disease and illness; and (3) bias toward cure rather than care [3]. The principle of mind-body dualism⎯viewing body and mind as being separate [4, 5]⎯as well as the favoring of objective over subjective data are certainly pervasive and cause damaging inequities in our current medical culture. The situation stems, in
Source: The AMA Journal of Ethic
Authors: Robert Learch, Jeremy Cumberledge
Institution: University of Kentucky
Language: English
Subfield: History and Philosophy of Science
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W77482746