Reference no: EM133475568

Case: For this assignment you must conduct an INTERVIEW to develop an ILLNESS NARRATIVE that you will analyze in a final PAPER.

Before you start you MUST read the article by Kleinman (1978) available to download here Download here.

An illness narrative is a description of a person's illness and its effect on their life. Arthur Kleinman, a psychiatrist and medical anthropologist, developed a series of eight questions that you will use to interview someone with a specific disease or condition. Before your interview, you should conduct some background research on the disease/condition; MedlinePlusLinks to an external site. is a good place to start. You can feel free to alter the wording of the questions to suit your interviewee and their disease/condition.

The required questions are:

1. What do you think caused your problem?
2. Why do you think it started when it did?
3. What do you think your sickness does to you?
4. How severe is your sickness? Do you think it will last a long time, or in your opinion will it be better soon?
5. What are the chief problems your sickness has caused for you?
6. What do you fear most about your sickness?
7. What kind of treatment do you think you should receive?
8. What are the most important results you hope to get from treatment?

You should aim for a 'thick description' of the illness, meaning that you should also try to ask questions about context-family, livelihood, etc.-and how these relate to the illness. This means you should begin your interview by asking some additional basic information about your participant (e.g., age, gender, where they live, occupation, family life, etc.).

Your interview should be done in person or over the phone, NOT via email. Your interview should take approximately one hour. You may interview a friend, family member, etc. This is NOT to be an autobiographical narrative (i.e., it CANNOT be about you). Be prepared to ask follow-up questions, and allow the person to elaborate on their answers.

IMPORTANT!!!: You MUST inform your subject that their answers will remain anonymous and will only be used in the context of this assignment. They also may decline to answer any of these questions. YOU CANNOT USE THE INFORMATION COLLECTED OUTSIDE OF THIS CLASS.

Once you have completed your interview, you will write a 5-7 double-spaced page paper that includes four sections, plus a reference list:

1. Section 1: Introduction. In this section you should briefly introduce the individual (no names!) and their condition (approx. 1 paragraph).
2. Section 2: Biomedical Description. In this section you should describe the biomedical dimensions of the disease/condition (e.g., epidemiology, symptomology, course/prognosis, common treatment, etc.) (approx. 1-2 pages).
3. Section 3: Illness Narrative. This is not a list of answers to your questions, but rather where you interpret and tell the story of the person's illness. You may use up to 2 (short) direct quotes from the interview. Use a pseudonym for the person-do not use their real name in any part of the assignment (approx. 2-3 pages).
4. Section 4: Reflection and Discussion. In this section you should compare and contrast the biomedical description of the condition with the experiences of the individual you interviewed. Reread the Kleinman (1978) article Download Kleinman (1978) articleand consider the differences and similarities in the biomedical vs. individual explanation of the condition and its treatment. You should also discuss why the illness narrative is an important tool for clinicians, using evidence from the literature and your own experience in this assignment. (approx. 2-3 pages).
5. A reference list of a minimum of 5 scholarly resources at the end of the paper. You can include the Kleinman article.