Bedring forstått i et medisinsk perspektiv - betydning for fysioterapi?

Abstract

The purpose is to describe recovery within a medical somatic perspective and examine how this perspective may affect the understanding of recovery in physiotherapy. According to a medical somatic perspective, disease is related to anatomic and physiological abnormalities, and health is understood as absence of such abnormalities. Close associations are believed to exist between biological dysfunctions, clinical signs and symptoms. Specific treatments are developed to normalize one or several of these aspects, and recovery is determined by evaluating their degree of normalization. Development of disease and recovery from it are believed to happen according to certain patterns. Hence, patients with similar diseases are expected to recover in the same manner and by means of the same targeted treatments. Specific treatments methods to normalize physical impairments are applied in physiotherapy as well, for example stretching. Here, medical perspective can be relevant. In other situations, therapy can be aimed to ease patients’ every-day life, and therapies are individualized according to the individual’s needs. Normalization of disrupted life may imply finding new ways of living. Here, often both therapeutic goals and content of treatment must be developed as parts of self-developmental and learning processes. The medical perspective poses limitations for exploring and understanding such processes.

Keywords

• physiotherapy
• medical perspective
• recovery
• rehabilitation
• therapeutics