Complement Ther Nurs Midwifery. 1996 Aug; 2(4): 102-5.

The sick role of proponents and opponents of complementary medicine.

Ernst E, Willoughby M, Weihamyr T.

Department of Complementary Medicine, Postgraduate Medical School, University of Exeter, UK.

Three different samples of patients completed a questionnaire aimed at assessing to what extent Parsons postulates for the sick role were adopted. Most patients did not agree with the first two postulates, namely that a sick person is liberated from part of his/her responsibility and that he/she cannot consciously decide to stop being ill. There was, however, agreement with the third postulate, that a sick individual is expected to seek help in order to get better. Amongst the total sample, the views of the sub-populations of proponents and opponents of complementary medicine showed little and those of chronic versus acute cases some discrepancies. From these findings hypotheses can be derived which could be formally tested through future investigations.