Describe adjustments of the Hmong to America and to biomedicine Case Study

Describe adjustments of the Hmong to America and to biomedicine - Case Study Example Adjustments of the Hmong to America and to biomedicine In the US, inequalities in the health care units caused many Hmong Americans to lack health care insurance; furthermore, they are usually served inappropriately. Restrains on welfare budgets have also contributed to the poor services offered to the Hmong Americans. Moreover, traditional curing strategies practiced by the Hmong and the American health practices are contributing factors to them being poorly served. The Western health providers never recognize the Hmong American culture. For example, a child with seizures among the Hmong immigrants was diagnosed with epilepsy at a Western hospital. They then sent her home with a complex and varying types of medicines, which the parents administered irregularly. The parents then thought the child was affected by evil spirits, and started treating the child with different remedies including offering animal sacrifices. Since the two cultures did not mingle, the child became brain dead due to a massive seizure, though her people kept caring for her. This shows the significance of cross-cultural medical system (Fadiman 18). When people move to a new place and they have to change their cultural systems, they can use their own cultural processes in understanding the new culture. This is made easier when there is participation on the site of the receiving culture. However, this assistance was not there for the Hmong. Every component of the American culture was very dissimilar to their culture. This entailed house styles and every other external appearance of American culture. They were not helped to understand their new environment apart from the only guidelines they had, which were of the Hmong culture, and this was not applicable to their new environment (Fadiman 19). The American biomedical field is different from those of the Hmong community because their beliefs are etical. Medical students and other medical experts are accustomed to the health care practices dur ing their trainings. For example, according to the American culture, the scientific concerns are the ones that are real and are of clinical significance. The Materialistic approach has influenced how the patients in the hospital are handled. The Biomedical view makes Americans to believe that, magic never exists and there exists no other substitutes apart from what they believe. This has made the American Medical professionals to think that their medical systems are superior globally. Their view is rigid and judgmental and has unpleasant effects when treating patients from the Hmong culture (Fadiman 19). The Hmong people have their beliefs concerning the symptoms and healing of illnesses. They do not depend on the germ hypothesis regarding the causes of diseases, unlike the Americans. To them, diseases are caused by control of spirits, soul loss, and infringement of taboo. Their healers make the identification of illnesses and prescribe the appropriate treatment, unlike the America biomedical system. The adjustments to the system were difficult for the Hmong. The barriers that contributed to the difficulties in getting medical care deliveries are the lack of English proficiency, qualified health interpreters, and lack of clinical terminologies in their language. The cultural obstacle that made their adaptation to American life difficult is lack of trust for the western medication. Furthermore, they lacked awareness of the medical systems. They had negative thoughts concerning the medications, because the health providers did not