University of Wisconsin doctoral candidate Margaret Pollak, with the guidance of Dr. Claire Wendland, will undertake research on the processes through which people form concepts of disease. Her particular focus will be on how multiple actors involved in chronic condition care develop and negotiate their understandings of disease.
The research will be conducted in Chicago, Illinois, with American Indian diabetics, informal caregivers, and biomedical providers. American Indians have some of the highest rates of diabetes worldwide. While more than sixty percent of American Indians live in urban areas, the majority of studies on the American Indian diabetes epidemic are centered on reservations. Research methods will include a combination of participant observation, participant shadowing, semi-structured interviews, and the collection and analysis of diabetes-related literature utilized by research participants. The project seeks to meet three overarching research objectives: (1) document the factors that shape patient and provider concepts of diabetes, (2) trace the movement of these concepts in order to understand the extent to which patient knowledge is shaped by biomedical models, as well as the extent to which patient knowledge influences biomedical models, and (3) investigate what role these diabetes concepts play in the constitution of an urban American Indian community.
The research has both policy and theory-building importance. It will extend scholarship in anthropology and science and technology studies by investigating how disease concepts are formed through social interactions as well as through biomedical evidence. Findings from this research also will offer insight to public health workers developing diabetes prevention and care programs to be implemented in urban and multicultural healthcare settings. In addition, the research will contribute to anthropological studies of urban American Indian life by investigating what role diabetes and concepts of the condition disseminated by local health and social institutions play in integrating individuals from varied tribal and personal backgrounds. Supporting this research also supports the education of a graduate student.
University of Wisconsin doctoral candidate Margaret Pollak, under the guidance of Dr. Claire Wendland, completed 12 months of ethnographic research on the processes of disease concept formation in an urban American Indian context. The aims of this project were to (1) to study how people learn, develop, and share knowledge about a chronic disease, and (2) to investigate the role diabetes concepts play in building and strengthening ties in a multi-tribal urban Native community. American Indians have some of the highest rates of diabetes worldwide. While more than two-thirds of American Indians live in urban areas, the majority of studies on the American Indian diabetes epidemic are centered on reservations. During the research period, Pollak performed observations of Native events and informal wellness programs, shadowed 14 diabetes patients, observed one medical appointment, completed 86 interviews with participants about diabetes and urban American Indian life, conducted archival research on the Federal Relocation Program and urban American Indian populations at the Newberry Library in Chicago, and collected diabetes-related literature from medical and social centers frequented by research participants. Pollak is using NVivo coding software to code data this research. This research contributes to anthropology, science and technology studies, and American Indian studies in several ways. First, this research extends medical anthropology studies of the diabetes epidemic in American Indian communities by focusing on an urban American Indian population. Second, this research contributes to the anthropology of knowledge and science and technology studies by examining the everyday processes through which knowledge about a chronic condition is developed and shared. Lastly, this research builds upon American Indian studies of urban Native life by investigating what role diabetes and concepts of the condition disseminated by local health and social institutions play in integrating individuals from varied tribal and personal backgrounds. In addition to the contributions made to academia, this research offers insight to public health workers developing diabetes prevention and care programs. Diabetes is an epidemic among American Indian populations in the United States of America. Medical anthropologists have found that the implementation of biomedical treatment programs has not been fully successful in multicultural healthcare settings. More effective diabetes treatment and prevention programs could be developed with the findings of this research in mind.
