Ethics, values, and world culture: the impact on rehabilitation

Cultural beliefs affect how health-care professionals and consumers interpret health, illness and disability. This discussion focuses on the therapeutic relevance of cultural beliefs; the implications of cultural practices and cultural values for rehabilitation theory; and the implications of cultural beliefs for social justice. Cultural beliefs cause people to learn 'approved' ways of being ill, influence their attribution of the aetiology of illness or disability, and determine what they expect from treatment and their physicians. Medical professionals need to be aware of cultural differences that can affect the outcome of treatment. Rehabilitation can also be culturally diverse. A universal, transcultural understanding of rehabilitation is possible, however, if it is understood that disabilities are concerned with integrated activities expected of the person or the body as a whole. If culture distinguishes how we engage the world, rehabilitation universally addresses the form of that engagement in its physical, behavioural, and/or cognitive manifestations.