1. The extent to which you feel you have attained the course objectives. Please be specific and address each of the objectives.
I believe that the medical sociology is isolated as a social institution. As a social institution, medicine has value (objectives, principles, and codes), structure, and function, form its organization, symbols, statuses and roles (doctors, patients, government, etc.), the system of vocational stratification and vocational education. Allocation of medical sociology as an independent branch was only in the 50s of 19th century in the United States. For the first time, a new industry was in demand for sociological education student health professionals (Cockerham, 2011).
In this course I found that the concept of demography and the subject of her study and the population and the requirements for its implementation. Concept and types of migration, the importance of migration processes. This course provided me a great deal of understanding the fertility and the factors influencing it, mortality and morbidity, its characteristics and dynamics. I found mortality as the incidence of death in the social environment, characteristics and directions of research in these setting demographics. It was very helpful to understand the causes and factors influencing the increase in overall mortality and the interdependence of health and mortality rates.
Among the factors contributing to increased morbidity and mortality, it should be divided into two groups of factors of geographic, climatic and socio-economic. Among the socio - economic allocate such as the economic crisis and the decline in the standard of living in society, social stratification, the low proportion of national income spent on health, increasing the imbalances and deterioration of food, water and others. For example, in the United States from 1982 to 1995, the number of patients with COPD has increased by 41.5% and amounted to 14 million people (6% of men and 3% of women) (Cockerham, 2011). Among people older than 50 years, the figure is 10%. In the UK, COPD is the third on disability. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is one of the most urgent problems of modern health care and one of the major causes of morbidity and mortality from chronic diseases in the world. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease stands out among the other forms a significant incidence of bronchopulmonary disease and poor prognosis (Cockerham, 2011).
The health of the population and society as a whole is defined as "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, community and individual. A method of prevention of public health is the introduction of educational programs, policy development, service, and research. With the concept of public health is the concept of vaccination. Great positive impact of public health programs is widely recognized. Partly because of health policy in the 20th century, recorded a decline in mortality rates of infants and children, as well as the continuous increase in life expectancy in many parts of the world. For example, it is estimated that the life expectancy of Americans has increased since 1900 by 30 years, and around the world for six years.
As per my understanding in the field of medical sociology, any model of physician-patient relationship requires respect for the rights of the patient. The patient's right to provide legal - law, ethically - respect for the right to autonomy.
After going through this course of medical sociology, I believe that the relationship between doctors, professional and patients in medical practice have their own specific and contain the points that are far from being resolved. In addition to those described in the work, I can point out the problem of elitism in the medical care of senior officers, the problem of providing medical services to the families of servicemen, the problem of insufficient technical equipment of the military medical service, which does not allow in some cases.
This course provided me understanding of sociopolitical dimension of health services delivery. As per my understanding, the goal of social policy is to improve the health of the nation, to provide adequate income and social support in certain adverse life situations and, in general, to create a favorable social atmosphere of the population in the community. Social policy is an integral part of the overall strategy of the state relating to the social sphere: purposeful activities to develop and implement solutions that are directly related to the person and his position in society.
In recent years, efforts to expand the scope of ethical analysis in the context of health care, to focus directly on issues of public health. In contrast to the traditional emphasis of experts in the field of bioethics at the relationship between doctor and patient, the focus of public health ethics is the development and implementation of measures to monitor and improve the health status of the population. In addition, the ethics of public health goes beyond the provision of medical care and examines the structural conditions that facilitate or hinder the development of a healthy society. Globally, the major issues in the ethics of public health are:
Inequalities in health status, access to health care and to the benefits of medical research. For example, questions about the allocation of resources depends in part on value judgments about the relative importance of small improvements in the quality of life of a large proportion of the population in comparison with the intervention in the name of saving lives, the benefits of which will only a few people.
2. Major New Knowledge Gained From the Course
This course "Medical Sociology" gave me the opportunity to get thoroughly reasoned answers to the eternal questions that at least once in my life asking myself more or less educated, and indifferent to the plight of my country's health services delivery identity that where our healthcare system is going. In this course, I did not find a sensational hypothesis, calculated to impress me to a beautiful and vivid imagination on the topic of medical sociology, but in fact, I found something to do with what really happened and is happening to us our healthcare system. It speculates on the national pride, ignorant of exciting national complacency. This course is extremely specific and objective analysis of the medical sociology, allowing a sober assessment of the roots of problems and their possible solutions. The course is also of interesting to policy makers (social scientists) seeking to bring real benefits to the country, healthcare services, to build their national healthcare system. In particular, this course has proved to be very useful to me in order to understand the subjects are of medical sociology.
3. What This New Knowledge Means To You in Your Work in Healthcare
This new knowledge is an important part of strengthening health systems that really means to me which is the human resource strategy. Because I have learnt that all over the world, the effectiveness of health systems and the quality of health services depend on the performance of employees who are defined by their knowledge, skills and motivation. There is ample evidence of the positive impact of the number, equal properties training of health workers, the density of their distribution on the results of the various activities in the field overall human health.
4. What This New Knowledge Means To You Personally
The fact is that many of the course objectives are carried to the grave, there is nothing new, for sure, each of us also take with them to the light of such a few, perhaps to protect someone, perhaps in order to protect their own reputation or legacy. My basic medical sociology study aimed at obtaining new knowledge about the basic laws of the functioning and development of medicine as a social institution, the formation of valuable relationships among different segments of the population to health, illness and health care (Cockerham, 2011), medicine and health organizations, to develop and implementation in practice of public health, social and economic activities to further improve the health status of the population and the organization of medical care. This new knowledge main objective is meaningful for me in terms of coordination of research activities and improving the quality and quantity of medical and sociological future study on fundamentally new directions in the sociology of medicine and health care.
References
Cockerham, W. C. (2011). Medical Sociology (12th Edition) (p. 432). Pearson. Retrieved from http://www.amazon.com/Medical-Sociology-Edition-William-Cockerham/dp/0205054188
