Abstract
ABSTRACTObjective:to describe the culture-bound syndromes maintained by Bolivian immigrants in the new migratory context and analyze the care processes of these health problems. Method:qualitative research with an ethnographic methodological approach. Sample: 27 Bolivian immigrants. In-depth interviews and participatory observation were the strategies used for data collection. Data were classified and categorized into logical schemes manually and using the ATLAS-ti program v.5. Results:susto, “wayras”, amartelo, pasmo de sol, pasmo de luna and pasmo de sereno are some of the folk illnesses that affect the Bolivian immigrants and that they have to treat in the new migratory context. Conclusions:in the new environment, the group under study preserves culture-bound syndromes that are common in their country of origin. The care strategies used for these health problems are adapted to the resources of the new context and based on interactions with the domestic environment, biomedicine and traditional medicine. It was observed the need for the health professionals to realize that the efficacy of certain therapies occurs within the scope of cultural beliefs and not in that of the scientific evidence.
Highlights
Biomedicine builds abiological, ahistorical and acultural diagnoses based on the language of the “empirical”. This “language of the concrete” gives them a scientific and objective basis, which confers their universal character. When these diseases are built as “culture-specific syndromes”(1) (Culture-Bound Syndromes), their complex etiology, description and treatment prevent them from having a “universal character”, which at first, makes them limited to certain geographic areas and cultural spheres
This study aims to find out whether the folk illnesses of the Bolivian immigrants coming from the Quechua, Aymara and Guarany/ Guarayo groups, as well as those who do not selfidentify with any ethnic group, are maintained in the new migratory context in Spain
Immigrants continue to categorize some of their illnesses as culture-bound diseases: fright, “wayras”, amartelo, pasmo de sol, pasmo de luna and pasmo de sereno, show us that in the new environment this group maintains their worldview, on which these diseases and the therapies necessary for their cure are based
Summary
Biomedicine builds abiological, ahistorical and acultural diagnoses based on the language of the “empirical” This “language of the concrete” gives them a scientific and objective basis, which confers their universal character. A culture-specific syndrome arises “when the members of a cultural group or community, by mutual agreement, identify a particular pattern of signs and symptoms, to which they attribute a certain causality, meaning and therapeutics, so that they become entities strongly influenced by the cultural context from which they arise”. In such cases, it is common the use of procedures of symbolic efficiency for the recovery of the patient(1). Mental Health and Transcultural Psychiatry is the field that has dedicated increasing attention to these health conditions and has devoted its best efforts in their classification and categorization(6-7)
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