Biological approach to health and social care Essay

The biological approach can be used to explain many thing within health and social care, it can also be useful in diagnosing and treating service users, and is effective for practitioners to asses and help their patience within heath care and social care alike. The biological approach can have a positive impact on the service user because tests such as the assessment scale are available so that they can fully understand why there behaviour is the way it is, and also what is normal and abnormal for their age. It is useful for practitioners to know if the influence of genetics has anything to do with a person’s behaviour so that they can give the service user the best possible help and attention. Genetic testing is also useful; it has potential benefits whether the results are positive or negative for a gene mutation. Test results can provide a sense of relief from uncertainty and help people make informed decisions about managing their health care. For example, a negative result can eliminate the need for unnecessary check-ups and screening tests in some cases. A positive result can direct a person toward available prevention, monitoring, and treatment options. Some test results can also help people make decisions about having children. New-born screening can identify genetic disorders early in life so treatment can be started as early as possible. A social care worker could use the assessment scale effectively on children to determine whether or not they have additional needs that need to be dealt with such as a learning disability, however once that child has being diagnosed with this problem the biological approach doesn’t then tell the practitioner how to treat or help that child, this is because every child’s needs are slightly different and there are a wide range of problems that need different treatment for. Also the assessment scale wouldn’t be useful within the health care sector for example caring for an adult with clinical depression, the assessment scale Is very limited and therefore is only useful within a small area of health and social care. However a service user with severe depression would benefit from the biological approach by focusing on genetic testing and medication. Depression is thought to involve both genetic and environmental factors, with genetics playing a larger role in the type of depression that is severe and recurrent, and a study has identified a region of DNA that may include a gene or genes that affect an individual’s vulnerability to severe persistent depression. From this research biological physiologists can make a clear  link between genes and depression and can then advice patience on the best possible method of improving their health. On a wider scale of health and social care hormones and brain activity can be used to explain why people behave in certain ways and how it can affect their everyday lives or others around them for example a patient with a brain damage, the biological approach explains why and how the person may react and how that particular injury effects their behavior. There are many strengths of the biological approach one strength is that this approach is supported by recent accurate research. Our understanding of genetics and the structure of human genes may be used as support, together with all the medical techniques, such as MRI, to show exactly how the brain and its chemicals affect our behaviour. For example, scans can show which part of the brain are active during a particular behaviour, which would help us to develop therapy. Another benefit of the biological perspective is that it has a high success rate in treatment. For example, someone might be given an antidepressant drug and might begin to feel better. Whether its medication or less common biological treatments, like therapy or Biofeedback; modern biological treatments have shown to be successful at treating mental illness, particularly in patients who do not respond well to talk therapy. .Despite this, it ignores the profound effect environment can have on people. For example, what if a patient is depressed because of personal problems such as losing his job, or death in a family. These are situations that can play a role in whether or not a person is feeling depressed., the biological perspective is often seen as limited, since it neglects other possible causes for behaviour, the impact of different cultural upbringings, mental states, and emotional desires. For example, it focuses too much on the ‘nature’ side of the nature/nurture debate. It argues that behavior is caused by hormones and genetics. One theory is that schizophrenia is genetic; however, twin studies show that it is not completely genetic and the environment has a part to play.