The Biopsychosocial Model in Medicine: Lost or Reasserted?

The biopsychosocial model, which has extraordinary merit for explaining and predicting health and well-being, has had relatively limited acceptance over the past 25 years. There may be a variety of reasons for this, but the forces that shape medical education must be taken into account if the biopsychosocial model is to be more fully accepted than it is currently. Two factors, medical school financing and medical school curricula, that are influenced by powerful forces within medical education are examined. Unless these forces are moved in a direction to benefit from the biopsychosocial model, it is unlikely that this important contribution will be fully acknowledged.