Questions to Determine Health Beliefs
These questions were developed by Arthur Kleinman, MD, professor of medical anthropology and chairman of the department of social medicine at Harvard Medical School in Cambridge, MA, to help practitioners learn about their patients’ health beliefs.
1. What do you call your problem? What name does it have?
2. What do you think caused your problem?
3. Why do you think it started when it did?
4. What does your sickness do to you? How does it work?
5. How severe is it? Will it have a short or long course?
6. What do you fear most about your sickness?
7. What are the chief problems that your sickness has caused for you?
8. What kind of treatment do you think you should receive?
9. What are the most important results you hope to receive from the treatment?
Source: Kleinman A. Patients and Healers in the Context of Culture. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press; 1980.
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