Reason and Rationality in Health and Human Services Delivery

Jean A Pardeck, John W Murphy, Charles Longino, Jr

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• eBook ISBN:
  9781317948599
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Health Care Delivery

Reason and Rationality in Health and Human Services Delivery is the first book to discuss the topic of decisionmaking and services from a multidisciplinary approach. It uses theory and social considerations, not just technology, as a basis for improved services. Health and human service students and professionals will learn how to form rational and reasonable decisions that take their clients'cultural backgrounds into consideration when identifying an illness or appropriating any kind of intervention. With a particular emphasis on theories, models, organizational settings, technologies, and practitioner training methods that lead to culturally sensitive decisions, Reason and Rationality will help you deliver efficient and improved medical and social services to clients from all ethnic backgrounds. Recognizing reason as the centerpiece of most of Western philosophy, this text reveals how our idea of truth, fact, and order are wrongly thought to be universal; yet, Western principles are continually used in the decision-making process for health and social services. Focusing on the policy implications of decisionmaking in medical and social service settings, this text works to incorporate a broad range of factors into the reasoning process, such as cultural traditions and beliefs, that will result in better treatment for patients. Giving you suggestions and strategies for upgrading reasoning and decision-making processes and applying them to every area of service, Reason and Rationality discusses different themes that will help you improve services to patients, such as:

• the rationale currently used to justify decision-making strategies concerning medical and human services
• using computer technology to make clinical assessments
• revising administrative structure, management theories, and organizational strategies so that decision-making processes enhance the overall quality of service delivery
• how the practitioner/patient relationship is important in choosing the proper treatment
• soliciting community-based input to assess the public's health and human service needs in order to lessen political involvement in decision-making stages In addition, Reason and Rationality provides information and examples that show why you should consider the "life-world"--the values, beliefs, and commitments of a culture's history-- as the key to understanding the powers of reasoning that specify parameters of health and illness.

Index

Aristotle

reason, 10

artificial intelligence

description of, 12

Babbage, Charles

reason, 12

Barthes, Roland

objectivity, 114

behaviorism

epistemology of, 37–38

biomedical model

and anti-dualism, 114; and the biopsychosocial viewpoint, 110–112; chronic disease, 102; critique of, 106–109; history of, 102–105; implementation of, 106–109; key characteristics of, 54, 103–104; and the life-world, 112–113; mechanical analogy, 105? mind-body dualism, 105; physiological reductionism, 106; and reason, 7; regimen and control; specific etiology, 106

biopsychosocial viewpoint

description of, 110–112

Boole, George

reason, 12

bounded rationality

description of, 40

Cassell, Eric J.

mind-body dualism, 105; critique ofthe biomedical model, 111, 112

Chopra, Deepak, 55

cognitive behaviorist theory

critique of, 34–35

Colby, Kenneth

computerized interviews, 25

communicative competence

description of, 16,113

community-based research

and community planning, 59; and data gathering, 62; and dualism, 61; key elements of, 58; and the life-world, 61; limitations of, 62–63; a new approach to medicine, 59; new model ofthe universe, 60; and objectivity, 61; questionnaire design, 61; and reductionism, 61–62

computer technology

and client interviews, 25; context of utilization, 26–29; and decision-making, 41; information proeessing, 40–41; information recording, 21–22; and inventory testing, 20–21; the language of computers, 20; management information system, 22–24; recommendations for the proper use of, 26–29; and research design, 25; and treatment plans, 21; word processing, 21

culture of science, 2–3

decision-making

care provider's perspective on, 68–70? computerized decision-making, 40–42; and the empowerment model, 43–45; Health Care Utilization Model, 72–79; Health Belief Model, 33–34; information processing theory, 36; and the lif...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Reason and Rationality in Health and Human Services Delivery: An Introduction
• Reason, the Life-World, and Health Care Delivery
• Rationalizing Decision-Making Through Computer Technology: A Critical Appraisal
• Sociomedical Models and the Epistemology of Risk: The Shortcomings of Medical Decision-Making Research
• Community-Based Epidemiology: Community Involvement in Defining Social Risk
• A World View Model of Health Care Utilization: The Impact of Social and Provider Context on Health Care Decision-Making
• Health Care Policy in Theory and Practice: A Review of the Process as a Product of Rational Decision-Making
• The Limits of Scientific Medicine: Paradigm Strain and Social Policy
• Index