[The ambiguity of the difference]

The article concentrates on the process of diagnosing disease, especially of common health problems. The biomedical concept dominates medicine in our days. However, the majority of the complaints presented to the general practician cannot be classified as distinct disease entities. An integral concept is far more suitable to integrate biomedical and psychosocial factors. In this way biomedical aspects acquire significance within an individual life story and social context in which gender plays a role. That is why the integral concept is more adequate to focus on sex differences in the diagnostic process. The article describes the impediments in this process, mainly due to the fact the prevailing concepts of disease ignore sex differences.