Medicalisation, pharmaceuticalisation, or both? Exploring the medical management of sleeplessness as insomnia

Sociology of Health & Illness
Catherine CoveneyJonathan Gabe

Abstract

In this paper we examine the medical management of sleeplessness as 'insomnia', through the eyes of general practitioners (GPs) and sleep experts in Britain. Three key themes were evident in the data. These related to (i) institutional issues around advocacy and training in sleep medicine (ii) conceptual issues in the diagnosis of insomnia (iii) and how these played out in terms of treatment issues. As a result, the bulk of medical management occurred at the primary rather than secondary care level. These issues are then reflected on in terms of the light they shed on relations between the medicalisation and the pharmaceuticalisation of sleeplessness as insomnia. Sleeplessness, we suggest, is only partially and problematically medicalised as insomnia to date at the conceptual, institutional and interactional levels owing to the foregoing factors. Much of this moreover, on closer inspection, is arguably better captured through recourse to pharmaceuticalisation, including countervailing moves and downward regulatory pressures which suggest a possible degree of depharmaceuticalisation in future, at least as far prescription hypnotics are concerned. Pharmaceuticalisation therefore, we conclude, has distinct analytical value in dire...Continue Reading

References

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Apr 21, 2017·Sociology of Health & Illness·Simon J WilliamsJonathan Gabe

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Citations

Jul 8, 2020·The British Journal of Sociology·Dana Zarhin
Mar 7, 2021·Pharmacy : Journal of Pharmacy, Education and Practice·Lewis H Glinert
Oct 4, 2021·Philosophy, Ethics, and Humanities in Medicine : PEHM·Emmanuel Bäckryd

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Methods Mentioned

BETA
cognitive behavioural therapy

Software Mentioned

NVivo

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