Social Context Matters
Social Context Matters
Cultural diversity is among the most notable perspectives in the modern world. The society encompasses people from all walks of life and backgrounds. Such diversity is evident through the racial backgrounds, cultural values and religious principles among others. It is fundamentally essential for medical educators to consider the various cultural perspectives in their teaching environments in order to enhance the learning outcome.[1] Failure to consider such cultural dimensions can hamper the capacity of health care practitioners to offer quality treatment.Similarly, social contexts are vital considerations while offering health care services to patients. This is because the social perspectives have an inherent capacity to influence the effectiveness of treatment plans. This justifies the integration of social context matters in teaching and health care. This paper seeks to examine the critical role of social considerations in medical studies. Additionally, the paper will also examine how social perspectives influence the quality of treatment in health care organizations.
The Importance of Social Contexts in Teaching Medicine
The curriculum in most medical schools involves rigorous academic studies. In addition to the rigorous academic schedules, medical students must also perform numerous experiments in order to hone their skills in health care.[2] Whereas these perspectives are vital with regard to the quality of medical education, it is pertinent for educators to integrate social contexts into the curriculum. In essence, emphasis on social contexts has extensive ramifications on the quality of outcome in medical studies. Following is an evaluation of the important aspects of social contexts while teaching medicine.
Ethical Values
Ethics is an essential aspect of consideration in health care. It serves as a framework of enhancing the decision making process with regard to different issues and challenges in health care practice. It is always essential to introduce health care practitioners to medical ethics as early as possible.[3] This prepares them adequately to face the different challenges of professional life in medicine. This necessitates the integration of social contexts in the curriculum for medical students. Without considering the various social dimensions, it is difficult for medical educators to establish an effective framework for ethics in the curriculum.
In essence, the ethical framework used in decision making has extensive social implications. For instance, a decision may be ethically acceptable to an individual but morally impermissible to others. Such perspectives are extremely essential in medical practice. For instance, ethics is a sensitive topic with regard to end of life treatment.[4] This is a sensitive area of medical care with extensive ethical considerations. When educators are aware of the cultural perspectives in which they teach, they prepare new practitioners to deal with different kinds of ethical challenges. Ethical perspectives are not only essential in low-social context societies but also in high social context societies. This is because they serve as vital platforms for averting conflict of interest while offering medical services. When health care practitioners are conversant with the prevailing social contexts, it is easier for them to make rational decisions. Such decisions are the backbone of efficiency in health care.
Personal Values
In addition to ethical perspectives, personal values are essential components of cultural contexts while teaching medicine. Personal values are critical elements when it comes to decision making in medicine. It is fundamentally essential for medical educators to develop a curriculum that helps health care practitioners to use their personal values in a positive way. In essence, personal values can enhance or undermine the quality of health care.[5] For instance, a health care practitioner can use personal values to maintain the highest standards of care for patients. Although personal values are essential, health care practitioners must not perpetrate personal interests while handling patients. This is an essential perspective that helps in preventing potential compromise in the quality of health care.
Levels of Social Contexts
In addition to the importance of social perspectives, it is crucial to examine the main domains of social contexts. Medical educators must ensure that they cover these aspects in the curriculum. This is helpful in terms of providing future medical practitioners with a platform for understanding the different social perspectives.[6]
Social Stressors
This serves as the first component of the domains of social context. In medicine, the concept of social stressors helps in evaluating numerous aspects about an individual. Firstly, social stressors are critical indicators of the various attributes causing stress within an individual’s life. In medicine and health care practice, it is fundamentally essential to evaluate the different issues affecting the wellbeing of an individual.[7] This is because an all-inclusive approach should be used in treatment. After identifying the various stress factors within an individual’s life, it is vital to examine how he deals with them. This also serves as an essential platform for developing an effective treatment plan for the patient.
Most health care practitioners tend to focus on the diagnostic and prescriptive aspects of treatment. This is because most medical educators do not emphasize on the evaluation of social stressors that affect an individual.[8] Consequently, this undermines the treatment outcome. It is thus essential for medical educators to emphasize on social contexts in terms of social stressors. Social stressors also encompass an evaluation of the role of close people in an individual’s life. Such people have direct or indirect implications on the wellbeing of an individual. For instance, some people are very close to their relatives. Religious values are also pertinent components of social stressors.Medical educators must emphasize on the role of religious values in an individual’s wellbeing. For instance, a patient might be strongly religious and as such, these values should not be ignored while developing a treatment plan for the patient.
While developing curriculums for medical studies, most educators do not emphasize on the role of spirituality in treatment of some patients. Consequently, this does not provide the upcoming practitioners with an effective basis of social contexts.[9] Whereas some people look up to God as the supreme healer, others do not have such believes. This justifies the importance of spirituality as a social stressor. In addition to the treatment plan, social stressors have an inherent capacity to influence the communication between the medical educators and students. In the modern world, medical and nursing students come from different cultural backgrounds. In order to establish an effective communication framework, educators must identify the various social stressors affecting the students. This is an essential aspect that helps in streamlining the learning process. The appreciation of social stressors is also helpful in establishing an effective rapport between the educators and students.
Change of Environment
Apart from social stressors, the second level of social contexts pertains to environmental perspectives. It is fundamentally essential for educators to understand the environments from which they hail from.[10] For instance, the United States has millions of people from other countries. The medical educators must take these perspectives into consideration while developing the curriculum. An individual might struggle to adapt to the new language. This can strongly hamper communications between the medical educator and the individual. This is an essential social perspective that can influence the treatment plan used in health care. For instance, some people might be uncomfortable living in a new country or state. This dimension should serves as an essential element of consideration while developing health care programs. The health care practitioner should also seek to examine the nature of medical standards in an individual’s original locality. Consequently, the change of environment affects the strategies used in health care as well as in teaching medicine.[11]
Literacy
Literacy serves as the third domain of social perspectives. The standards of literacy vary in different social contexts. It is fundamentally essential for health care practitioners to understand the literacy levels of patients. For instance, it is crucial for the nursing practitioner to establish whether the patient can read. If the patient is illiterate, the practitioner must ensure that she does not offer a treatment plan that seems discriminatory.[12] This is because the physician might be tempted to dupe the patent. Irrespective of the patient’s literature, it is crucial to maintain the highest standards of ethics. This is a useful platform that facilitates for the most appropriate treatment outcome. When offering prescriptions, the health care practitioner has the responsibility of ensuring that the patient can follow all instructions to the letter.[13] The failure to consider the patient’s literacy levels can easily compromise the quality of treatment. While training medical practitioners, educators should enlighten the learners about the importance of literacy as a social perspective that is evident in different patients. Although it might be challenging to deal with such patients, health care practitioners should be proficient enough to address these problems effectively.
Life Control
This is the fourth domain social domain of consideration with regard to the education standards for health care practitioners. The capacity to determine the direction in which one’s life takes encompasses life control. Some individuals have the capacity to control their life through intangible platforms while others can easily use tangible platforms.[14] As a pertinent social perspective, life control is a useful social component for consideration in health care. Medical educators should train upcoming practitioners on the various ways of assimilating life control into the treatment framework.
There are various attributes influencing life control from a social perspective. Firstly, the nature of income can undermine or enhance an individual’s capacity to control his life. In the event that a patient is financially secure, there is the possibility that such an individual has a greater degree of life control.[15] This is in contrast to a financially weak patient who might not necessarily have sufficient control over his life. In essence, the nature of income has an inherent effect on the standards of living. Consequently, the medical educators should train upcoming practitioners about the importance of considering an individual’s control over life prior to developing a treatment plan.
Apart from the income level, the patient’s support network is another pertinent issue of consideration while developing a treatment plan for patients. However, most medical educators do not address the role of support networks while training health care practitioners. Support networks are essential social contexts that influence the wellbeing of an individual. A patient with an excellent support network has a higher degree of life control.[16] However, the situation is different for an individual who lacks an effective support network. It is extremely crucial to pinpoint that the evaluation of an individual’s life control is extremely sensitive.
Some patients might be reluctant to share information about their private lives. Consequently, medical educators should train the health care practitioners about the most appropriate strategies for handling these challenges. Such challenges often arise when the patient lacks sufficient control over his life. He might perceive this situation as a weakness and thus fail to communicate openly with the health care practitioner. When the health care practitioners have sufficient knowledge about these challenges, they can empathize with the patients and thus convince them about the significance of disclosures. Irrespective of the patient’s plight, the practitioner must be as fair as possible. This approach is vital in terms of streamlining the quality of treatment for all patients.
Consequences of Inadequate Emphasis on Social Contexts
Inadequate emphasis of social contexts in medical studies has adverse effects on health care in America. In most medical and nursing schools, educators seem to focus extensively on technical aspects of health care such as technology.[17] Whereas technical aspects of medicine and nursing studies are extremely essential in health care, there is the need to emphasize on social contexts. Aspects such as economic and racial diversities are clearly evident in the population. Appreciation of such diversity is an essential element for enhancing the quality of health care. Without this approach, the country’s medical systems will continue to delineate some people while favoring other individuals. These are undesirable perspectives in any health care system. Consequently, it is fundamentally crucial for medical educators to emphasize on social contexts while training health care practitioners.[18] This will be an essential framework towards enhancing ethical standards in the country’s health care system. The negligence of social contexts is also likely to increase the total costs incurred in the country’s health care system. This is because incidences of preventable errors will be extremely high.
Conclusion
The different perspectives about social contexts in medical studies are evident in the different sections. Without considering the various social dimensions, it is difficult for medical educators to establish an effective framework for ethics in the curriculum. In essence, the ethical framework used in decision making has extensive social implications. For instance, a decision may be ethically acceptable to an individual but morally impermissible to others. Such perspectives are extremely essential in medical practice. In medicine, the concept of social stressors helps in evaluating numerous aspects about an individual. Social stressors are critical indicators of the various attributes causing stress within an individual’s life. In medicine and health care practice, it is fundamentally essential to evaluate the different issues affecting the wellbeing of an individual. This is because an all-inclusive approach should be used in treatment. This is an essential social perspective that can influence the treatment plan used in health care. For instance, some people might be uncomfortable living in a new country or state.
References
Barry, Vincent. Bioethics in a cultural context. Boston, MA: Wadsworth, 2011
Bleakley, Alan. & Browne, Julie. Medical education for the future. NY: Springer Science, 2011
Ende, Jack. Theory and practice of teaching medicine. ACP Press, 2012
Kumagai, Amo. & Lypson, Monica. Beyond cultural competence. Academic Medicine, 84(6): 781-786, June 2009
Satcher, David. & Farmer, Paul. Social medicine in the 21st Century. iMedPub, 2011 (49- 53)
Swanwick, Tim. Understanding medical education: Evidence, theory and practice. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2011
Is this your assignment or some part of it?
We can do it for you! Click to Order!
