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Academic Year 2015-2016
Event Title
Healthcare, Negotiation, and Power in Agate, Ghana: ‘All I Need is Help to do Well’
Location
Cotilla Gallery (2nd floor), Alvin Sherman Library, Research, and Information Technology Center
Start Date
11-2-2016 12:00 PM
End Date
11-2-2016 1:00 PM
Disciplines
African History | African Languages and Societies | African Studies | Alternative and Complementary Medicine | Anthropology | Biological and Physical Anthropology | Community Health and Preventive Medicine | Health Services Research | International Public Health | Medicine and Health | Medicine and Health Sciences | Public Health | Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies | Religion | Sociology
Description
This research examined illness and ways of negotiating health treatment from sociological and anthropological perspectives using qualitative methods in Agate, Ghana. Researchers interviewed 29 men and women over 50 years of age about whether and how they treated recent illnesses and with what results. Several themes arose from the interviews. Many critical obstacles to successful health treatment existed. However, participants creatively used various methods to try to negotiate a flawed healthcare system as best as they could. Participants blended religious/spiritual approaches including herbs, fasting, and prayer with western medicines, increased dependence on their social networks, and used various components of Ghana's National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) to varying degrees.
![](http://nsuworks.nova.edu/far_fls_headshots/1005/preview.jpg)
![](http://nsuworks.nova.edu/far_fls_headshots/1036/preview.jpg)
Healthcare, Negotiation, and Power in Agate, Ghana: ‘All I Need is Help to do Well’
Cotilla Gallery (2nd floor), Alvin Sherman Library, Research, and Information Technology Center
This research examined illness and ways of negotiating health treatment from sociological and anthropological perspectives using qualitative methods in Agate, Ghana. Researchers interviewed 29 men and women over 50 years of age about whether and how they treated recent illnesses and with what results. Several themes arose from the interviews. Many critical obstacles to successful health treatment existed. However, participants creatively used various methods to try to negotiate a flawed healthcare system as best as they could. Participants blended religious/spiritual approaches including herbs, fasting, and prayer with western medicines, increased dependence on their social networks, and used various components of Ghana's National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) to varying degrees.