ArticleBMJ global health2024
Rapid ethnographic appraisal of community concepts of and responses to joint pain in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.
Article in BMJ global health, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
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Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed, 1 citations in OpenAlex.
- How do musculoskeletal disorders impact on quality of life in Tanzania? Results from a community-based survey.BMJ open · 2025Article
- ' … You become a prisoner of your life': A qualitative study exploring the experience of joint pain and accessing care in Hai, Tanzania.SSM. Qualitative research in health · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionMusculoskeletal disorders, experienced as joint pain, are a significant global health problem, but little is known about how joint pain is categorised and understood in Tanzania. Understanding existing conceptualisations of and responses to joint pain is important to ensure both research and interventions are equitable and avoid biomedical imposition.
methodsRapid ethnographic appraisal was conducted in a periurban and rural community in Kilimanjaro, documenting language used to describe joint pain, ideas about causes, understandings of who experiences such pain, the impacts pain has and how people respond to it. We conducted 66 interviews with community leaders, traditional healers, community members and pharmacists.Photographs were taken and included in fieldnotes to supplement the interview data and develop thick descriptions. Data were analysed by constant comparison using QDA Miner software.
resultsAcross the sample, dominant concepts of joint pain were named
conclusionsConceptualisations of and responses to joint pain in the two communities were syncretic, mixing folk and biomedical practices. Narratives about who is affected by joint pain mirror emerging epidemiological findings, suggesting a strong 'lay epidemiology' in these communities. Anthropological methods can support the decolonisation of global health by decentring the imposition of English language biomedicine and pursuing synthetic, dignified languages of care.
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