Polarised medical pluralism
In the past decade, North America has witnessed the emergence of integrative healthcare (IHC) clinics, in which practitioners of different clinical backgrounds (alternative and biomedical) offer holistic person-centered care in a spirit of cooperation. This phenomenon is a challenge for anthropologists interested in the analysis of the interaction between diverse forms of health-related knowledge. The objective of this study, in addition to its ethnographic dimensions, was to identify and analyse the factors that either foster or impede the articulation and negotiation of different points of views related to an illness episode. During a field study in a Quebec IHC cooperative, the therapeutic experiences of fifteen participants were examined. The conceptual framework, with its innovative use of the concept of explanatory models of illness, made it possible to analyse the interaction between the perceptions of the actors involved in the health care process (patient and practitioners). The following hypotheses emerge from the preliminary data analysis : the patient’s representation could be a communication channel that attenuates the constraints of epistemological and language barriers. Beyond the fact that it’s in keeping with a central postulate of IHC, recognizing the importance of the patient’s point of view also appears to facilitate the transition from multidisciplinary to interdisciplinary team work, a fundamental process for development of this new care paradigm.