Biomedical subjects

C Ritenbaugh

Publications and source records attributed to C Ritenbaugh.

57 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

PubMed1984

Recommended therapeutic guidelines for professional weight control programs.

At the present time there are no established guidelines to serve as standards for the operation of weight control programs. This increases the possibility that some programs may be conducted in a fashion that is unethical, jeopardizes patient health, and lacks credibility. As a first step toward developing such standards, a panel was organized by the International Congress on Obesity to describe minimum recommended features of professional weight control programs. The present report served as a supporting document for the summary statement and describes recommended guidelines for the treatment of obesity encompassing diet, physical activity, and behavior modification with psychological support. The role of drugs and surgery is not considered in this report. For the average patient it is suggested that three components of therapy--diet, exercise, and behavioral/psychological support--be prescribed together since they are closely interrelated, interdependent and mutually supportive.

Behavior Therapy↗

PubMed1982

Obesity as a culture-bound syndrome.

Although the term "culture-bound syndrome" has been used for many years, a concise definition has not been available. The less precise synonym "folk illness" has implied that such syndromes exist only in other cultures. This paper provides a four-part definition to permit examination and comparison of disease categories in any system, including biomedicine. Anthropologists have tended to view biomedicine as the standard for comparison, and have not examined it in the same critical light as other systems. This may be due in part to a confusion of the biomedical classificatory system (biomedicine per se, emic level) with the biological data on which in is based (etic level). One can in fact retain use of the biological data while analyzing biomedicine, which is understood to include cultural components. Mild-to-moderate obesity in the U.S. today fits the proposed definition of a culture-bound syndrome. This paper offers a brief overview of the evidence that culture has shaped both the definition of the disease over time and its treatment.

Adult↗

PubMed1981

Anthropology and nutrition: a perspective on two scientific subcultures.

In the last several years serious collaborative efforts between nutrition scientists and anthropologists have begun to bear fruit. To encourage the development of such collaboration, it is useful to consider the professional scientific subcultures of each discipline and how these condition the ways in which we view research problems and methodology. Anthropologists and nutrition scientists share many values and assumptions by virtue of common membership in the larger culture and in the subculture of science. There are substantial differences, however, many of them rooted in the fact that anthropology is primarily an observational science while nutritional science has been primarily experimental in nature. Successful collaboration will result from the formation of long-term communicative relationships rather than from ad hoc utilization of the other discipline. We offer some suggestions for how this may occur, and submit that understanding our own professional subcultures is essential to interdisciplinary efforts.

Anthropology, Cultural↗