Cross-cultural psychiatric assessment of Greek and Swedish patients at a Swedish primary health centre
Engelsk titel: Cross-cultural psychiatric assessment of Greek and Swedish patients at a Swedish primary health centre
Författare:
Löfvander, Monica
;
Papastavrou, Dimitri
Språk: Eng
Antal referenser: 19
Dokumenttyp:
Artikel
UI-nummer: 50551
Sammanfattning
The aim of this study was to validate or discard the theory that psychiatric disorders lay behind a group of Greek patients' somatic complaints. A further aim was to assess the possibility of making a reliable psychiatric assessment despite language and cultural barriers between doctor and patient. A conclusion of this study could thus be to focus more attention on the health situation of immigrant men in general in Sweden, especially those from culturally distant areas, which increases both the psycho-social stress on the immigrant in his process of adaption and the risk of social isolation in the host country. The authors also believe that a satisfactory understanding of the illness behaviour of Greek immigrants and other comparable underprivileged groups must include anthropologic as well as biologic, psychologic, and social aspects. Failure to decode illness behaviour and various coping strategies leads easily to "medicalization".