ABSTRACT
The “biomedical model” (BMM) and the “biopsychosocial model” (BPSM) are contrasting conceptual models or frameworks that organize our thoughts, knowledge, and experience in medicine and clinical practice. The BMM has been the dominant model, understanding disease and clinical knowledge and practice in terms of biomedical science, and the BPSM was put forward, especially in the writings of George Engel (Engel 1977, 1981), as a criticism and corrective, urging more serious inclusion of psychological and social factors into our thinking. This chapter discusses both models, with emphasis on the latter.
