Concepts of body and health in physiotherapy: The meaning of the social/cultural aspects of life

Abstract

The concept of the body which highlights the social and cultural aspects of life and an open concept of health, served as the theory for this study as well as the inspiration from two models of clinical practice. The data consist of observations of the practice of physiotherapy of seven hip arthroplasty patients, seven open semistructured interviews with the patients, followed by open semistructed interviews with the seven physiotherapists. The results showed that the physiotherapists only used their incidental knowledge of social/cultural aspects of the patients' lives to motivate the patients to comply with the physiotherapy regimen. The physiotherapists gave a much higher priority to the physical capability of the patients than to social/cultural aspects. As experts, the physiotherapists legitimised the dialogue with the patients. The physiotherapists were not able to perform clinical practice according to the above mentioned concepts of body and health since they did not have enough information about cultural/social aspects. The patients had little or no direct influence upon the contents of the physiotherapy regimen. Finally, the author discusses this rather paternalistic clinical practice.