The Spirit Catches You and You Fall: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures is a biographical book written by Anne Fadiman and published in 1997. The book is about the conflicts that arise when a Hmong family sends their daughter Lia to Merced Community Medical Center (MCMC) for treatment of her epilepsy. Unable to understand the customs and culture of Hmong society, tensions rise between modern doctors and traditional Hmong parents. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayThe first time Lia got sick was when her older sister, Yer, slammed a door and a few moments more late, Lia's eyes rolled; her arms went above her head, then she fainted. Lia's parents, the Lees, recognized her symptoms as qaug dab peg, meaning a spirit grabs your soul and you fall. The spirit is called a dab. A dab is a malevolent soul-stealing spirit. So, because of the scary sound of the slammed door, Lia's soul fled her body and is now lost. When a Hmong dies, their soul becomes a wandering soul; a wandering soul is one that must travel from place to place, retracing the path of its life, until it reaches the burial place of its placental jacket and puts it on. However, if the soul cannot find its jacket, it is condemned to an eternity of wandering, naked and alone. In Hmong-English dictionaries, qaug dab peg is usually translated as epilepsy. Qaug dab peg is a well-known illness in Hmong society and recognized as a serious and potentially dangerous illness. A congressman from Merced named Tony Coelho from 1979 to 1989 is a popular Hmong figure known for his epilepsy. A few years ago, some local Hmong men were concerned enough when they learned that Coelho suffered from qaug dab peg. So the Hmong men enlisted the services of a shaman, known as a txiv neeb, to perform a ceremony that would recover Coelho's wandering soul. Hmong epileptics often become shamans because their seizures are seen as proof that they have the power to see the things of others. can't. In addition to facilitating their entry into trance, prior to their journey into the kingdom of the invisible. The fact that they have been ill themselves allows them to sympathize with the suffering of others, thus giving them credibility as healers. Becoming a neeb txiv, that is, a person with a healing spirit, is not a choice, it is a calling. The call is obtained when a person falls ill, either due to qaug dab peg or due to another illness whose symptoms also include chills and pain. Therefore, when a person exhibits these symptoms, they are chosen to be the host of a healing spirit. It is an offer that the patient cannot refuse. But some Hmong chose to decline the offer. Shamanism is a demanding vocation that requires years of training with a master in order to learn all the ritual techniques and chants. A txiv neeb achieves enormous social status in the Hmong community because he or she is considered a person of high moral character. Compared to a biomedical doctor, doctors study for years to obtain a medical degree in order to be credible. The authority is given to a doctor in the coming years within the hospital system. When the Lees took their daughter Lia to MCMC, Lia had stopped seizing by then. The Lees had no way of explaining to the doctor what happened to Lia due to their lack of knowledgemedical and especially the language barrier. Although there is usually an interpreter working as a janitor at the hospital, this time he was not there. Lia showed symptoms of chest congestion and coughing when the resident ordered an X-ray of Lia's chest. The radiologist said Lia had an early case of bronchopneumonia or tracheobronchitis. The resident had no way of knowing that the bronchial congestion was caused by the aspiration or entry of saliva or vomit into his lungs during his attack. Lia was sent away with a prescription for an antibiotic. When Lia lived with her foster family Dee Korda, she was on prescription anti-seizure medication, however, she still suffered from seizures, more so than when she lived with her parents. Lia's doctor, Peggy Philp, prescribed Lia a series of medications at different times that stop the grand mal seizures, but they still didn't work and at one of these times, Lia suffered a seizure. attack triggered by fever. Doctors had concluded that Lia would not be able to live more than a few years due to her ongoing cycle of seizures, but she had lived much longer than expected. Every time Lia had a seizure and showed up at the emergency room, her two doctors Neil Ernest and Peggy Philp were called, no matter the time. Doctors prescribed the medications and explained to parents how they were administered. However, Lia always fell ill quickly afterward; since the parents had no way of understanding because of the language barrier and even if it was translated to them by the janitor or Lee's parent, the parents had no way of writing down the instructions because they were all two illiterates. Additionally, Lia's parents usually don't give her the medications her doctors prescribe. They think Western medicine is bad and would make their daughter sicker. Doctors and nurses at MCMC generally do not like to treat patients from Hmong society due to the language barrier and cultural differences. They dislike Hmong patients to the point that doctors sarcastically say that the preferred treatment method for Hmong patients is high-velocity transcortical therapy, which means the patient must be shot in the head. Hmong behavior and cultural beliefs stress hospital staff. For example, nurses become stressed and anxious when a Hmong woman makes no noise while in pain during childbirth. Many taboos in Hmong medicine have been troublesome, some of which are very important in helping to diagnose a patient's health problem; such as blood tests, lumbar punctures, surgeries, anesthesia and autopsies. This causes frustration for medical staff since these are the only methods they have learned and need to help patients recover. Therefore, when Hmong patients reject the treatment their doctors give them, they become irritated because they have no other way to help the Hmong people other than what they learned in medical school. . An incident occurred when resident Dr. Benny Douglas had a patient who was an elderly Hmong woman with gastric cancer and he failed to persuade her sons to consent to her operation, resulting in led resident Dr. Benny Douglas to develop severe insomnia. frustrations.Keep in mind: This is just a sample.Get a custom paper from our expert writers now.Get a custom essayWestern medicine is unfavorable in Hmong culture and society because for 24, 2012.