The meaning of symptoms and disorders -- The personal and social meanings of illness -- The vulnerability of pain and the pain of vulnerability -- The pain of living -- Chronic pain: the frustrations of desire -- Neurasthenia: weakness and exhaustion in the United States and China -- Conflicting explanatory models in the care of the chronically ill -- Aspiration and victory: coping with chronic illness -- Illness unto death -- The stigma and shame of illness -- The social context of chronicity -- The creation of disease: factitious illness -- Hypochondriasis: the ironic disease -- The healers: varieties of experience in doctoring -- A method for the care of the chronically ill -- The challenge of a meaning-centered model for medical education and practice
