Biomedicalization and the Embodied Self: Mechanisms of Medical Authority in Breast Cancer Management

Abstract

Drawing on biopower and embodiment, the article examines how biomedical authority in breast cancer care is produced through technologies (mammography, genetic testing, advanced imaging), institutional hierarchies, and standardized protocols. These mechanisms expand surveillance from disease to risk, privilege visual/objective evidence over lived sensation, and convert informed consent into procedure, narrowing autonomy. The analysis conceptualizes breast cancer as an embodied disruption: treatments reconfigure appearance, sexuality, and intimacy, generating body alienation and identity dissonance; reconstruction sits ambivalently between self-recovery and biomedical normalization. Yet agency persists. Individually, patients seek second opinions, combine complementary practices with conventional care, and cultivate “epistemic agency” via self-education. Collectively, advocacy networks mobilize narratives and lobby for integrative, patient-centered models that rebalance psychosocial with clinical outcomes. The article’s contribution is to link biomedicalization to identity work and to delineate “structural coercion” whereby choice is constrained within guideline-driven menus. It calls for care arrangements that retain the benefits of standardization while institutionalizing dialogic consent, legitimizing embodied testimony, and broadening success metrics beyond survival toward quality, dignity, and control.

Keywords : biomedicalization; embodiment; biopower; patient autonomy; standardized protocols; structural coercion; breast cancer.

Received Date: July 19, 2025                    

Accepted Date: August 11, 2025                  

Published Date: August 30, 2025

Available Online at https://www.ijsrisjournal.com/index.php/ojsfiles/article/view/426