Is there a medical anthropology of rheumatic heart disease? By Dr Suzanne Belton
A report presented at the RHD Australia Conference 2013: Practice and Culture by Dr Suzanne Belton of the Menzies School of Health Research, has been submitted to the journal Rural and Remote Health.
The paper, Is there a medical anthropology of rheumatic heart disease?, focuses on how medical anthropology could assist with reducing rheumatic heart disease (RHD).
Dr Belton states, "Medical anthropology can offer insights into RHD and in particular how this disease of poverty and disadvantage is understood and embodied by its sufferers.
"Medical anthropology may assist with lessening the burden of this disease by forming a wholistic understanding which may be translated into better primary health care and clinical services by incorporating people’s agency, disease embodiment, language and symbolism into research designs."
The paper addresses the question, ‘What could a medical anthropological approach offer in better understanding and banishing this disease of neglect and inequality?’