What is the biomedical model?
• Shahid H Zaman, SHO psychiatry Southmead Hospital, Bristol, Avon, BS10 5NB Quite often in mental health services circles, the concept of the “biomedical model” is misunderstood. Although it takes a reductionist (but not absolute reductionist) stance, it approaches the study of the phenomenon of health function/dysfunction from both a “bottom-up” and a “top-down” approach. The dimensions of culture, sociology and indeed psychology as causation factors are certainly not ignored or over-ruled as perhaps suggested by the Double article, but are integral in this approach. Observation through quantitative and qualitative measuring or analysis tools is at the heart of scientific enquiry. A shortcoming of such tools will be reflected in the present day theories and explanations of phenomena. Just because we at present have a less thorough understanding of psychological or sociological phenomenon than e.g. molecular biological ones, it is seems unwise to abandon the present scientific (i.e. b
