Journal of Psychosomatic Research
Volume 57, Issue 1 , Pages 79-87 , July 2004

What if my back breaks? Making sense of musculoskeletal pain among South Asian and African–Caribbean people in the North West of England

  • Anne Rogers

      Affiliations

    • Corresponding Author InformationCorresponding author. Tel.: +44-161-256-3015x251; fax: +44-161-275-7600
    • National Primary Care Research and Development Centre, School of Primary, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
  • ,
  • Tim Allison

      Affiliations

    • East Yorkshire and Yorkshire Wold and Coast Primary Care Trust, UK

Received 14 October 2002 ,Accepted 8 July 2003.

References 

  1. Smith BH, Chambers WA. The epidemiology of chronic pain in the community. Lancet. 1999;354:1248–1252
  2. Wiener C. The burden of rheumatoid arthritis: tolerating the uncertainty. Soc Sci Med. 1975;9:97–104
  3. Williams GH. The genesis of chronic illness: narrative reconstruction. Sociol Health Illn. 1984;6:175–200
  4. Williams GH, Wood PHN. Common-sense beliefs about illness: a mediating role for the doctor. Lancet. 1986;II:1435–1437
  5. Bury M. The sociology of chronic illness: a review of research and prospects. Sociol Health Illn. 1991;4:167–182
  6. Albrecht GL, Devlieger PF. The disability paradox: quality of life against all odds. Soc Sci Med. 1999;488:977–988
  7. Williams D, Thorn B. An empirical assessment of pain beliefs. Pain. 1989;36:351–358
  8. Chew-Graham C, May C. Chronic low back pain: the challenge of the consultation. Fam Pract. 1999;16(1):6–49
  9. Fenton S, Sadiq-Sangster A. Culture, relativism and the expression of mental distress: south Asian women in Britain. Sociol Health Illn. 1996;18(1):66–85
  10. Bhopal R. Is research into ethnicity and health racist, unsound or important science?. BMJ. 1997;314(7096):1751–1756
  11. Kai J, Hedges C. Minority ethnic community participation in needs assessment and service development in primary care: perceptions of Pakistani and Bangladeshi people about psychological distress. Health Expect. 1999;2:7–20
  12. Njobvu P, Hunt I, Pope D, Macfarlane G. Pain amongst ethnic minority groups of South Asian origin in the United Kingdom: a review. Rheumatology. 1999;38(12):1184–1187
  13. Croft P. The epidemiology of chronic widespread pain. J Musculoskelet Pain. 2002;10(1–2):191–199
  14. Allison TR, Symmons D, Brammah T, Haynes P, Rogers A, Roxby M, et al. Musculoskeletal pain is more generalised among people from ethnic minorities than among white people in Greater Manchester. Ann Rheum Dis. 2002;61:151–156
  15. Busby H, Williams GH, Rogers A. Bodies of knowledge: lay and biomedical understandings of musculoskeletal disorders. Sociology of Medical Science & Technology. Sociol Health Illn Monogr. 1997;79–100
  16. Fenton S, Charsley K. Epidemiology and sociology as incommensurate games: accounts from the study of health and ethnicity. Health. 2000;4(4):403–425
  17. Karlsen S, Nazroo J. Agency and structure: the impact of ethnic identity and racism on the health of ethnic minority people. Sociol Health Illn. 2002;24(1):1–20
  18. Unwin M, Allison T, Brammah T, Busby H, Roxby M, Williams G. Estimating the burden of musculoskeletal disorders in the community: the comparative prevalence of symptoms at different anatomical sites and the relation to social deprivation. Ann Rheum Dis. 1998;57(1):649–655
  19. Holt L. Articular cartilage. In:  Gilliland I,  Peden M editor. The scientific basis of medicine annual reviews. London: Athlone Press/Postgraduate Medical Association; 1973;
  20. Croft PR, Papageourgiou AC, Ferry S, Thomas E, Jayson MIV, Silman AJ. Psychological distress and low back pain. Spine. 1995;20:2731–2737
  21. Hellstrom O, Bullington J, Karlsson G, Lindqvist P, Mattsson B. Doctors' attitudes to fibromyalgia: a phenomenological study. Scand J Soc Med. 1998;26(3):232–237
  22. Currer C. Concepts of well and ill-being: the case of Pathan mothers in Britain. In:  Curer C,  Stacey M editor. Concepts of health, illness and disease. Leamington Spa: Berg; 1986;
  23. Salmon P, Woloshynowych , Valori R. The measurement of beliefs about physical symptoms in English general practice patients. Soc Sci Med. 1996;42(11):1561–1567
  24. Allison T, Rogers A, Symmons D, Brammah T, Urwin M, Lowcock D. Musculoskeletal pain in ethnic minority communities. Exec Sum 15. Manchester: NPCRDC; 2000;
  25. Morse J, Mitcham C. The experience of agonizing pain and signals of disembodiment. J Psychosom Res. 1998;44(6):667–680
  26. Bury M. Chronic illness as biographical disruption. Sociol Health Illn. 1982;4(2):167–180
  27. Scarry E. The body in pain. New York: Oxford Univ. Press; 1985;
  28. Aldrich S, Eccleston C. Making sense of everyday pain. Soc Sci Med. 2000;50(11):1631–1641
  29. Senior P, Bhopal R. Ethnicity as a variable in epidemiological research. BMJ; 309;327–30.
  30. Anderson J, Moeschberger M, Chen MS, Kunn P, Wewers ME, Guthrie R. An acculturation scale for Southeast Asians. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. 1993;28(3):134–141
  31. Wilson M, MacCarthy B. GP consultation as a factor in the low rate of mental health service use by Asians. Psychol Med. 1994;24:13–119
  32. Bhopal K. South Asian women in East London: religious experiences and diversity. J Gend Stud. 1998;7(2):143–156
  33. Aspinall PJ. Operationalising the collection of ethnicity data in studies of the sociology of health and illness. Sociol Health Illn. 2001;234(6):829–863

PII: S0022-3999(03)00570-1

doi: 10.1016/S0022-3999(03)00570-1

Journal of Psychosomatic Research
Volume 57, Issue 1 , Pages 79-87 , July 2004