The science of medicine attempts to give clear explanations for how the human body functions, what causes it to get sick, and how it can be healed. Yet many aspects of medical care are less predictable and depend on social interactions between people.

To better understand these nuanced aspects of patient care, knowledge in the field of anthropology can be useful. Anthropology is the comparative study of human relations, of social and cultural life. It is a field rooted in one key methodology – ethnography, which involves participating in and observing people’s lives within a community. Ethnography gives researchers first-hand experience into how people live in their everyday lives, as opposed to what someone may report about their life in a survey.

The social complexity that anthropologists study can have an enormous influence on people’s health. It can affect their access to health care, why they choose to seek medical help for some conditions and not for others, why they resort to traditional medicines, how they take care of their bodies and what they perceive to be physical and psychological signs of good health. The responses can vary enormously across cultures, age groups, genders, socioeconomic backgrounds and religions.

Taking an anthropology course can expose premed students to a set of basic skills that can help them better address these issues as they embark on patient care. Such a course can help prepare them for patient care in three ways:

Catering health care to the needs of individuals and communities.

Learning how to ask questions better.

Empathizing with patients.

Catering Health Care to the Needs of Individuals and Communities

While we understand how many diseases are contracted, spread and treated, this knowledge is not always enough to totally prevent them. Prevention and treatment of specific conditions are not always one-size-fits-all in every given context because people’s lifestyles, cultures, beliefs and finances may impact the degree to which they can accept or fully integrate certain medical recommendations and treatments into their lives.

For instance, during the Ebola epidemic in West Africa that extended from December 2013 to January 2016, anthropologists collaborated with public health officials and organizations to improve ongoing interventions to end the epidemic. Since one of the main ways in which Ebola can be transferred is through contact with the body of the deceased, the medical community had recommended that bodies be cremated.

This clashed with local burial practices. To avoid people carrying out traditional funerals in secret and risk further contracting and spreading of the virus, anthropologists and health organizations worked with local community and religious leaders and health care practitioners to develop new, alternative funeral-related practices that were medically safe and respectful of mourning families’ local traditions.

This collaborative effort, based on ethnographic research, made a decisive contribution to ending the Ebola epidemic in that region.

Anthropology students are taught to think critically about social and cultural factors that can affect disease prevention and treatment. A class in anthropology can therefore help those in the medical field appreciate that a one-size-fits-all approach does not work in the delivery of care and encourages students of medicine to constantly think about how they can cater the care they deliver to the needs of individuals and the community.

Learning How to Ask Questions Better

A big part of anthropology is ethnographic research, which involves spending time with people and participating in and observing their lives. The way we each think, feel, act, speak and relate to one another is very complex and influenced by many internal and external factors. By spending prolonged periods of time in people’s everyday lives, anthropologists gradually become familiar with the complexity of people’s lives.

While a course in anthropology will not give you the chance to do exactly that, it will expose you to ethnographic methodologies that will teach you how to ask the right questions and prompt answers that can help you get a full picture of a patient’s condition and any relevant lifestyle information.

Anthropology also encourages you to pay attention to what people do not tell you, as much as what they do. This can help shed light on the many diverse reasons why a patient may not voluntarily divulge certain information. With a basic understanding of ethnographic approaches, you can more effectively interact with patients and families, be a keen observer and ask appropriate questions to better understand their illness as well as their concerns.

Empathizing With Patients

Illnesses have social implications that can vary from culture to culture. In some societies, certain conditions may be more embarrassing and feared than others.

For instance, vitiligo, a skin disease that leads to the development of white patches on the body or melanin loss all over, is stigmatized in some cultures and can lead to social exclusion. Affected individuals often have a hard time finding a spouse or employment.

From a purely medical standpoint, vitiligo is not life-threatening and does not cause pain or other physical discomfort. As a result, some healthcare providers may view this autoimmune disease as purely cosmetic and not fully appreciate the burden it places on individuals.

By listening effectively to a patient’s concerns and asking the right questions, the practitioner will further appreciate why a condition like vitiligo is so painful and socially unbearable for some patients. A course in anthropology can equip you with the skills to better understand the impact of illness on the lives of patients, more effectively empathize with them and help them deal with the consequences of their illness.

It is worth noting that no course in anthropology will make a student well versed in all cultures. However, it can create a greater awareness of the social nuances that influence health care in different contexts and teach you to look for these nuances. This can have an impact on the way you interact and care for patients as a premed volunteer, med student and practicing physician.