The social implications of questionable cancer therapies
The social implications of questionable cancer therapies
复制标题
可疑的癌症疗法的社会影响
作者：
B. Cassileth
有问题的或“非正统”的治疗方法不是在真空中选择的;它们的流行程度和使用的特定类型是其社会和文化背景的函数。在本世纪早期流行的液体制剂反映了对瓶装药物的迷恋，这与不断增长的药物时代相一致。今天有问题的补救办法同样符合其社会和文化背景。“代谢”疗法强调饮食、自我护理、维生素和内部清洁，沿着“免疫增强”疗法，代表了当今占主导地位的“替代品”。这些方法反映了潜在的社会趋势和价值观，例如对个人健康承担责任的信念、自我护理和身体健康的重要性、病人权利运动、传统和替代医学鼓励的饮食重点、整体医学运动以及对有组织医学的普遍不满。正如有问题的疗法是由他们文化的价值观和信仰所产生的一样，这些治疗方法及其使用也会影响它们所存在的社会环境。这种关系是相互的和循环的，社会趋势鼓励特定形式的可疑制度，而这些制度反过来又加强了普遍的社会信仰。公众对癌症的信念反映在我们对非正统癌症治疗和生存的心理社会相关性的研究中。回答揭示了人们对癌症、癌症治疗和医学普遍持有的价值观和信念。这些主题被描述。
Questionable or “unorthodox” treatments are not selected in a vacuum; their degree of popularity and the particular types used are functions of their social and cultural context. The liquid preparations that were popular earlier in this century reflected fascination with bottled medicinals, consistent with the growing era of pharmaceutical medicine. Today's questionable remedies are similarly consistent with their social and cultural context. “Metabolic” therapies emphasizing diet, self care, vitamins, and internal cleansing, along with “immune‐enhancing” regimens, represent today's reigning “alternatives.” Such approaches reflect underlying social trends and values, such as belief in assuming personal responsibility for one's health, the importance of self care and physical fitness, patients' rights movements, dietary emphases encouraged by conventional and alternative medicine alike, the holistic medicine movement, and general disaffection with organized medicine. Just as questionable therapies are born of the values and beliefs of their culture, so these treatments and their use affect the social environment in which they exist. The relationship is reciprocal and cyclic, with social trends encouraging particular forms of questionable regimens and these regimens, in turn, reinforcing prevailing social beliefs. Public beliefs about cancer were reflected in responses to our studies of unorthodox cancer therapies and of psychosocial correlates of survival. Responses revealed widely held values and beliefs about cancer, cancer treatment, and medicine generally. These themes are described.