Alpha-blockers and a weaker pharmaceutical influence on medical discourse

• This section of this book explores local examples of a pharmaceutical’s ability to influence the treatment of established medical conditions and redefine health problems as issues with a pharmaceutical solution. The previous chapter explored the influence Viagra had on the medical discourse in Sweden. In this chapter, I am again relying on an analysis of the medical discourse in the Swedish-language medical journal Läkartidningen. From it, I have retrieved research articles and debate pages that appear when the journal’s online archive is searched for the Swedish words associated with lower urinary tract symptoms secondary to benign prostate hyperplasia (LUTS/BPH): BPH, prostatahyperplasi and prostatahypertrofi. 1 I have conducted a search for the years between 1990 and 2015, since alpha-blockers started to become a more common treatment method in Europe for LUTS/BPH in the 1990s (EUA 2006, 35) and were registered as a treatment for BPH in Sweden in the early 1990s (Carlsson and Spångberg 1996a, 4549; Hallin 1999, 3520). This time frame mirrors that used for Viagra in the previous chapter.

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Annan samhällsvetenskap -- Genusstudier (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Other Social Sciences -- Gender Studies (hsv//eng)

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Annan samhällsvetenskap -- Tvärvetenskapliga studier inom samhällsvetenskap (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Other Social Sciences -- Social Sciences Interdisciplinary (hsv//eng)

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

kap (subject category)