The gendered experience with respect to health-seeking behaviour in an urban slum of Kolkata, India.

Background: Empirical evidence shows that the relationship between health-seeking behaviour and diverse gender elements, such as gendered social status, social control, ideology, gender process, marital status and procreative status, changes across settings. Given the high relevance of social settings, this paper intends to explore how gender elements interact with health-seeking practices among men and women residing in an Indian urban slum, in consideration of the unique socio-cultural context that characterises India's slums.

Methods: The study was conducted in Sahid Smriti Colony, a peri-urban slum of Kolkata, India.

Patterns of illness disclosure among Indian slum dwellers: a qualitative study.

Background: Slum dwellers display specific traits when it comes to disclosing their illnesses to professionals. The resulting actions lead to poor health-seeking behaviour and underutilisation of existing formal health facilities. The ways that slum people use to communicate their feelings about illness, the type of confidants that they choose, and the supportive and unsupportive social and cultural interactions to which they are exposed have not yet been studied in the Indian context, which constitutes an important knowledge gap for Indian policymakers and practitioners alike.