Why is there a difference between curing and HEALING?
The major focus of this book has been on the provider’s and the patient’s differing perceptions of health/HEALTH and illness/ILLNESS. These differences may account for the health care provider’s misconception that services are used inappropriately and that people do not care about their health. What to the casual observer appears to be “misuse” may represent our failure to understand and to meet the needs and expectations of the patient. This possibility may well be difficult for health care providers to face, but careful analysis of the available information seems to indicate that this may—at least in part—be the case. How, then, can we, who are health care providers, change our method of operations and provide both safe and effective care for all—the emerging majority and, at the same time, for the population at large? The answer to this question is not an easy one, and some researchers think we are not succeeding. A number of measures can and must be taken to ameliorate the current situa- tion. CULTURAL CARE and the educational preparation leading to this is a pro- cess, one that becomes a way of life and must be recognized as such. This is a philosophical issue. The changing of one’s personal and professional philoso- phies, ideas, and stereotypes does not occur overnight, and the process, quite often, is neither direct nor easy. It is a multistep process, in which one must: