An Introduction to Medicalization

. Socio-economic Inequities and the Health Sector, 2014

Medicalization, an international phenomenon for some time now, has been responsible for proliferation of diseases and prescription of medical solutions by increasingly extending the medical categories to multiple aspects of people's lives. It has been further encouraged by pharmaceuticalization, biomedicalization and geneticization. Medicine still holds the centre stage in the process of medicalization but, along with it, the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, the health-care markets and the aspirations of human desire, rather than a quest for health, have been accountable for the medicalization and overmedicalization of society. A deleterious result of disregarding the social context of complicated problems and educating people that non-diseases are diseases, have resulted in an increase in consumption of unnecessary drugs and diagnostic procedures. The possibility of meaningful health care reforms has therefore become problematical, especially in 'a pill for every ill' cultural disposition that is created, promoted and sustained by unbridled medicalization.

2013

Aporia, 2011

British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, 2021

Pharmaceutical industry and drugs advertisement is sometimes accused of "creating diseases". This article assesses and describes the role of that industry in fostering medicalization. First, the notions of medicalization and pharmaceuticalization are defined. Then, the problem of distinguishing between harmful overmedicalization and well-founded medicalization is presented. Next, the phenomenon of disease mongering is explained and illustrated by the case analysis of medicalizing pain and suffering in three contexts: 1) the general idea of medicalizing physical pain, 2) the medicalization of grief, and 3) disease mongering of pseudoaddiction-a condition promoted in order to increase the demand for opioid pain relievers.

Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 1991

Вестник Саратовского государственного технического университета. 2011. №4 (60). Вып.2. С.256-263., 2011

Статья посвящена вопросу о социокультурной гегемонии медицины в современном обществе, которая рассматривается с помощью понятия «медикализация». Анализируются идеи ряда западных исследователей, обсуждавших этот вопрос в 1970-2000-е годы, а также эволюция этих идей. The article is devoted to the issue of social and cultural hegemony of medicine in modern society, which is considered by the term «medicalization». The ideas of a number of Western scholars who discussed the issue in the 1970-2000's are analysed, as well as the evolution of these ideas.

The aim of the thesis is twofold. The first objective is to describe and analyze experiences with antidepressant treatment for depression as expressed in adverse drug reaction (ADR) reports from patients, i.e. “consumers reports.” A second goal is to conduct a theoretical discussion, by looking at broad societal changes, and analyzing the consequences of mental ill health as a significant public health problem. Special attention is given to medicalization.

Holism and Complementary Medicine. Origins and Principles. Allen and Unwin, Crow's Nest, NSW, 2006

2013

The ongoing 'enhancement' debate pits critics of new self-shaping technologies against enthusiasts. One important thread of that debate concerns medicalization, the process whereby 'non-medical' problems become framed as 'medical' problems. In this paper I consider the charge of medicalization, which critics often level at new forms of technological self-shaping, and explain how that charge can illuminate-and obfuscate. Then, more briefly, I examine the charge of pharmacological Calvinism, which enthusiasts, in their support of technological self-shaping, often level at critics. And I suggest how that charge, too, can illuminate and obfuscate. Exploring the broad charge of medicalization and the narrower counter charge of pharmacological Calvinism leads me to conclude that, as satisfying as it can be to level one of those charges at our intellectual opponents, and as tempting as it is to lie down and rest with our favorite insight, we need to gather the energy to have a conversation about the difference between good and bad forms of medicalization. Specifically, I suggest that if we consider the 'medicalization of love,' we can see why critics of and enthusiasts about technological self-shaping should want (and in some cases have already begun) to distinguish between good and bad forms of such medicalization.

European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, 2005

This review presents the definition and goals of ''social pharmacology'', a new branch of clinical pharmacology, investigating relationships between drugs and society through the example of ''medicamentation'', defined as the use of drugs for social problems previously not requiring drug utilisation (ageing, smoking cessation, vigilance troubles, sleep synchronisation, loss of libido, etc.). The involvement of the different ''actors'' from our society (patients, physicians, pharmaceutical industries, clinical pharmacologists, regulatory agencies, etc.) in this phenomenon is also discussed.