Illness

The ‘sick role’:

• Most people have experienced illness

• Increasingly, chronic illnesses in the west

• All have an impact on ‘normal functioning’

• Family, work, finances

• Illness reflects the interactions between bodies, individuals and society

Chronic illness

• Illness can lead to dependency and a sense of self-disturbed

• Social interactions based on reciprocity, thus cannot make too many demands

• Responses to illness moulded by social, cultural and physical feedback

The Sick Role

• Core principle - presence of illness must be sanctioned by the medical profession Parsons (1951)

• Distinguish between the biological and social basis of illness

• Illness based on norms and values of any society

• Sickness is deviance, ‘unconscious motivation’ to leave adulthood

• The sick person is not culpable

• Granted certain rights, privileges and obligations

• Normal social obligations suspended, not held responsible for illness

• To take on the sick role, the individual must try to get better and seek medical advice

Problems with the sick role:

• Asymmetrical relationship

• Type of illness (idiopathic)

• Identity of the individual (chronic illness)

• Carry on regardless

• Frequent attenders

• Gender, social class, ethnicity, age, etc

Application to clinical practice:

• Awareness of people’s ability to cope and take on role

• Political shift

• Changing nature of health and illness

• Contested illness