Chronic Pain and Working Women of Berkshire County: Towards a Critical Physical Therapy

Pain is the most frequent cause of impairment and disability in the United States. Chronic pain can be described as a complex interaction of biological and socio-cultural factors. The general purpose of this work is to describe and analyze the hegemonic nature of physical therapy practice, in the United States, as an agent of Western/Biomedicine in the treatment of working women with chronic pain using a critical medical anthropological(CMA) lens. It will be demonstrated that for physical therapy the body, especially the female body, is to be corrected, regulated, placed under surveillance, disciplined, and is a commodity to be controlled, all the while transforming women with chronic pain into consumers of the multibillion dollar chronic pain industry. The examination and analysis of chronic pain through a CMA lens provides a corrective to the biologically reductionist diagnostic and treatment approach that is characteristic of Western/Biomedicine.