What is in a name? Autonomic imbalance and medically unexplained symptoms in Taiwan, 2021, Chen

Abstract
Medically unexplained symptoms (MUS) are persistent bodily symptoms without known pathology. An unofficial term has recently emerged in Taiwan to accommodate MUS: autonomic imbalance (AI). AI literally refers to disturbances of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) that innervates vital organs. However, AI is variously conceptualised by different parties. This study intends to investigate what is in the name of AI. It draws on available databases and in‐depth interviews with AI sufferers and Western and Chinese medicine physicians. Some physicians research ANS functions through heart rate variability measurements. Research findings show that physicians regard AI as a convenient term for clinical communication and a euphemistic substitute for MUS or even psychiatric diagnoses. It is not a ‘real thing’. However, AI sufferers treat AI as a bona fide disease, only that it has not been officially classified. AI is therefore an unfaithful translation, or an uncontrolled equivocation, of MUS. The paper concludes by discussing the implications of treating AI as an equivocation. These implications include the limitations of the current diagnostic criteria, the necessity to rethink the dichotomy of mind and body, and the underlying realities exposed or masked by ‘diagnosis’.

Open access, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-9566.13262

 

what a wonderful world if your an academic create paper that introduce deliberate obfuscation into previously understood terminology and then someone else can write papers to underline said deliberate obfuscation . how do we lesser mortals get on this gravy train .

 

Do they know Jon Stone?