Soc Sci Med. 1987 ; 24(12): 1061-8.

The Kur in West Germany as an interface between naturopathic and allopathic ideologies.

Maretzki TW.

In countries where biomedicine developed from earlier medical knowledge, medical pluralism provides unusual cultural parameters and perspectives on biomedical epistemologies. Past therapy traditions, which are still salient in the biomedical system of West Germany today, are examined historically and ethnomedically. The Kur, now part of a complex system of rehabilitation medicine utilizing medical bathing and environmental stimuli, illustrates divergent ideologies in the contemporary German health care system. The influence of cultural, social, and political-economic factors on therapeutic eclecticism and directions are discussed as cultural dynamics of the biomedical system in general.