Patient Multiple - An Ethnography of Healthcare and Decision-Making in Bhutan

In the Himalayan Kingdom of Bhutan, medical patients engage a variety of healing practices to seek cures for their ailments. Patients use the expanding biomedical network and a growing number of traditional healthcare units, while also seeking alternative practices, such as shamanism and other religious healing, or even more provocative practices. The Patient Multiple delves into this healthcare complexity in the context of patients' daily lives and decision-making processes, showing how these unique mountain cultures are finding new paths to good health among a changing and multifaceted medical topography.

List of contents

List of Figures

Acronyms

Notes on Language

Dzongkha Reference Guide

Acknowledgements

Map

Introduction

Chapter 1. The Patient Multiple: Cures, Healths and Bodies

Chapter 2. Modernising Traditional Medicine: A Two-Option Healthcare Service

Chapter 3. An Ethnography of Decision-Making

Chapter 4. Alternative Practices and the Removal of Ja Né

Chapter 5. Patients and Healing Materials: Relations and Dependency

Conclusion: Assembling Patient Multiples and Complementary Logics of Care

Bibliography

Index

About the author

Jonathan Taee holds a PhD in Social Anthropology from the University of Cambridge. He has conducted ethnographic research and worked in Tibet, Peru, Nepal, India, the USA and Bhutan.

Summary

In Bhutan, medical patients engage a variety of healing practices to seek cures for their ailments. The Patient Multiple delves into the context of patients' daily lives and decision-making processes, showing how these unique mountain cultures are finding paths to health among a changing and multifaceted medical topography.

Product details

• Authors: Jonathan Taee
• Publisher: BERGHAHN BOOKS, INC
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 30.06.2020
• EAN: 9781789207965
• ISBN: 978-1-78920-796-5
• No. of pages: 242
• Series: WYSE Series in Social Anthropology; Wyse Social Anthropology
• Subjects: Natural sciences, medicine, IT, technology > Medicine > General; Social sciences, law, business > Social sciences (general); Bhutan, MEDICAL / Alternative & Complementary Medicine, MEDICAL / Health Care Delivery, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / Cultural & Social, Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography, complementary medicine, Social and cultural anthropology, Health systems & services, Health systems and services, Complementary and alternative medicine and therapies