Delayed help-seeking in acute coronary syndrome — view of a problem in terms of narrative medicine

Abstract

The article suggests the reasons for the delayed help-seeking in patients with acute coronary syndrome in terms of individualization of work. For analysis, the approach of narrative medicine was used, that is, a way to conceptualize medical situations using the methods of the humanities, or rather, to understand the disease as an event in the patient’s life — his biographical narrative. These categories are important both from the standpoint of ethics and patient orientation, and from the standpoint of health improving through education of the population. A number of attitudes are shown that lead to delay in help-seeking: rigidity of thinking, unwillingness to cause discomfort, atypical manifestations, distrust of medicine and the unknown medical process. In general, the inclusion of a disease in the biographical process occurs through denial of the disease, distrust of medicine and/or healthcare, procrastination. As a solution of these problems, an assessment of the general informational background of patients as society participants and education depending on the social category, is proposed.