Cultural influences on the incidence and pattern of disease.
Society and its doctors influence disease patterns; examples are taken from two world wars. The high incidence of ulcerative colitis in Jews is seen as cultural rather than racial; differences and changes in the sex incidence of the disease are discussed in terms of altered male versus female rôles. The epidemiological puzzle of multiple sclerosis is examined from the standpoint of a cultural determinant possibly working through a psychosomatically disordered immune response. Hypotheses are advanced for the epidemic of duodenal ulcer and its recent decline accompanied by an increase in coronary disease. Sufferers from both disorders are 'work-addicts'; society's new disregard for work and the Puritan ethic may be influential.
D000328:Adult; D001293:Attitude to Death; D002648:Child; D003093:Colitis, Ulcerative / Q000453:epidemiology*; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000453:epidemiology*; D003466:Cultural Characteristics; D003469:Culture; D004381:Duodenal Ulcer / Q000453:epidemiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007585:Jews; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009103:Multiple Sclerosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D012067:Religion; D012737:Sex Factors; D006113:United Kingdom