Summary

pp. 177-181

in: Fredrik Svenaeus, The hermeneutics of medicine and the phenomenology of health, Berlin, Springer, 2000

Abstract

This study has been an attempt to develop an ontology and epistemology of medicine with the aid of the philosophical theories of phenomenology and hermeneutics. Medicine has in this work been considered to be a particular form of practice with a certain intersubjective structure, rather than an assembly of scientific theories and technologies applied in the clinic. To be more precise, medicine has been suggested to be an interpretive, helping meeting between two persons (doctor or other healthcare professional and patient) aimed at bringing about health for the ill, help-seeking party. Phenomenology and hermeneutics have then been used to more fully understand what is meant by an interpretive, helping meeting and by its goal — health.