Lay constructions of HIV and complementary therapy use

Dorothy Pawluch, Roy Cain and James Gillett

Social Science & Medicine, 2000, vol. 51, issue 2, 251-264

Abstract: This study examines the meanings that individuals with HIV attach to their use of complementary therapies. A qualitative analysis of 66 interviews completed between 1993 and 1998 showed that complementary therapies represent different things for these individuals -- a health maintenance strategy, a healing strategy, an alternative to Western medicine, a way of mitigating the side-effects of drug therapies, a strategy for maximizing quality of life, a coping strategy, and a form of political resistance. We found that the meanings individuals ascribe to complementary therapies and the benefits they expect to derive from them are not idiosyncratic, but linked to social characteristics -- sexuality, ethnocultural background, gender -- and to beliefs about health and illness, values and experiences. We found as well that these meanings are neither mutually exclusive nor fixed. The therapies often appeal to individuals on different levels and their appeal may change over time.

Keywords: HIV/AIDS; Complementary; therapies; Lay; constructions; Coping; and; health-seeking; behaviour; Ontario; (Canada) (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2000
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(99)00450-5
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:socmed:v:51:y:2000:i:2:p:251-264

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/supportfaq.cws_home/regional
http://www.elsevier. ... _01_ooc_1&version=01

Access Statistics for this article

Social Science & Medicine is currently edited by Ichiro (I.) Kawachi and S.V. (S.V.) Subramanian

More articles in Social Science & Medicine from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().