Melissa Ceuterick
Biographic Data
| ID | 127730 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Melissa Ceuterick |
| GIVEN NAMES | Melissa |
| FAMILY NAME | Ceuterick |
| SIGNATURE | CEUTERICK M |
| AFFILIATIONS | Ghent University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-1376-9524 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 33 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 85 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 33 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Dependence vs. addiction
Background Opioids occupy an ambivalent position in contemporary healthcare: they are recognized as effective pain relief but remain heavily stigmatized due to their association with addiction. Drawing on Scambler’s stigma framework, this article examines how Belgian Dutch-language policy documents construct the concepts of ‘dependence’ and ‘addiction’ in the context of chronic pain management.Methods We analyzed 32 policy documents on opioid use…
Psychotherapists’ Discursive Constructions of Culture and Cultural Conversations in Therapy
Disparities in the quality of mental healthcare services for majoritized versus minoritized clients are pronounced, while therapists draw on intuition and wider societal ideologies rather than professional training to confront the question of how to address clients’ cultural identities and backgrounds in psychotherapy. This signals a gap between theoretical calls for cultural sensitivity and the practical implementation of culturally responsive c…
School Matters
Structural factors shaping health-seeking behaviour among breast cancer survivors in the Gaza Strip
This paper aims to analyse the enabling and disabling factors for health-seeking behaviour among Palestinian breast cancer survivors in the Gaza Strip. Specifically, it investigates how the availability of and accessibility to healthcare services influence health-seeking behaviour during the detection and treatment stages. The core components of the Right to Health—accessibility, availability, acceptability, and quality serve as the theoretical f…
The (Stigma) Power of Discourse
Mental health issues, such as depression, are prevalent in Belgium, particularly among individuals with a migration background. General practitioners (GPs) may inadvertently contribute to these disparities through unconscious biases and stereotypes. This study investigates how Belgian GPs’ accounts reflect, perpetuate, or resist stigmatization toward patients with a migration background experiencing mental health issues and how these accounts are…
Medicinal Plant Use and Diversity in the Urban Area of Idiofa, Democratic Republic of Congo
Medicinal plants are being used by communities worldwide to treat various conditions, diseases, and illnesses. Nevertheless, knowledge of their use is rapidly declining due to factors like accelerated urbanization, globalization, and biodiversity loss. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, deforestation, and urbanization are the main drivers of biodiversity loss. In order to gain insight into how urban communities in the Democratic Republic of Con…
Adolescents’ stigmatizing attitudes and social distance toward peers with depression
Mental health stigma poses a significant burden on affected individuals, particularly adolescents, who are especially vulnerable to its consequences. However, the processes and predictors of adolescent mental health stigma remain underexplored. Guided by the Etiology and Effects of Stigma model, this study examines a broad range of factors that shape mental health stigma in this population. Data were drawn from the Red Noses Culturally Sensitive …
Medicinal plant use in a context of coloniality
Coloniality refers to patterns of power that emerged as a result of colonialism beyond the strict limits of colonial administration. Members of the Congolese community in Belgium -being the formerly colonized in the country of the former colonizer- live in an obvious context of coloniality. Medicinal plant use is common among the Congolese community in Belgium, and cultural forces play a significant role in the health and healthcare beliefs and p…
General practitioners’ repertoires of patients with a migration background and mental health problems
Purpose Despite a higher prevalence of mental health problems among people with a migration background, recent studies indicate these patients have more unmet medical needs and are under-represented in mental health services. General practitioners (GPs) are central gatekeepers in treatment and referral to specialised mental health care. However, their recommendations can be influenced by beliefs, social norms and practices that might prejudice pe…
Patients, Trauma Survivors, Sweethearts, or Troublemakers
Despite the high level of scientific support for the effectiveness of opioid substitution treatments (OSTs), individuals who rely on this treatment are a highly stigmatized population within healthcare settings. Previous studies mainly focused on the experiences of OST clients, while the perspective of medical professionals regarding OST remains largely unexplored. This study aims to investigate the discourse of pharmacists and general practition…
Pain by proxy
Individuals with chronic pain using opioids
Chronic pain, defined as pain persisting for more than three months, affects one in four Belgian adults. Treating chronic pain comprises challenges for patients and clinicians as the term encompasses diverse conditions such as fibromyalgia, migraine, and long-term pain without a known biomedical cause. Additionally, growing evidence highlights the limited efficacy of opioids in managing chronic non-cancer pain. This has prompted critical policy c…
Risk, emotion and responsibility
Under processes of responsibilisation and individualisation in the ‘risk society’, as well as discourses of intensive motherhood, mothers are expected to make ‘good’ decisions regarding their children’s health. Consequently, decision-making concerning childhood vaccination becomes an emotionally challenging process, as mothers strive to minimise risk while simultaneously promoting and protecting health. Existing research shows that a substantial …
Healthcare Professionals’ Discursive Constructions of Parental Vaccine Hesitancy
Healthcare professionals play a crucial role in addressing the concerns of vaccine-hesitant parents since they form a trusted source for vaccine-related information. An increasing body of evidence suggests that healthcare professionals are faced with complexities when navigating the sensitive topic of parental vaccine hesitancy, as they balance their own vaccine- and context-specific concerns with institutional and societal pressures to vaccinate…
Plant use and perceptions in the context of sexual health among people of Congolese descent in Belgium
Background The use of medicinal plants is integral to global healthcare systems, with Sub-Saharan Africa maintaining a robust tradition of herbal medicine alongside Western-oriented healthcare. As migrant communities tend to continue traditional herbal practices after migration, documenting this use is vital to develop culturally sensitive healthcare. This study investigates plant usage and perspectives in the context of sexual and reproductive h…
Through a kaleidoscope
A higher prevalence of depression is found among patients with a migration background within the Belgian population. Nevertheless, this group is underrepresented in ambulant and residential mental health care services. Since general practitioners (GPs) have a crucial gatekeeping role, this led some researchers to investigate the possibility of a provider bias influencing GPs' assessment and referral of depressed patients with a migration backgrou…
Medicinal Plant Use Among the Congolese (Democratic Republic of Congo) Community in Belgium
Trends in the use of benzodiazepine receptor agonists among working-age adults in Belgium from 2004 to 2018
Introduction: The use of psychotropics, such as benzodiazepine receptor agonists (BzRAs), among working-age adults in Belgium has shown educational differences. However, it is unclear how work status plays a role in this relationship. Therefore, this research aims to investigate whether work status explains observed educational differences in BzRA use. In addition, considering medicalisation processes, where non-medical factors, such as work stat…
Athra,” a maternal illness in the rural Punjabi-Pakistan, as a source of stigma
Individual, interpersonal, and organisational factors associated with discrimination in medical decisions affecting people with a migration background with mental health problems
This paper showed that lower levels of trust among GPs' towards their migrant patients and high GP workloads contribute to an increased ethnic bias in medical decision-making. This may perpetuate ethnic inequalities in mental health care. Future researchers should develop an intervention to decrease the ethnic inequities in mental health care by addressing GPs' trust in their migrant and ethnic minority patients
From prescribing dilemma to knowledge in practice
And they slept happily ever after
Drawing on a critical social-psychological framework for discourse analysis, data from a popular forum for people over 50 were analysed to study how the habitual use of benzodiazepines and Z-drugs (BZD/Z) is discursively negotiated by Flemish older adults. We present five different repertoires (risk and addiction; alternative pathways; suffering; rationalisation; cessation) that illustrate how a pharmaceutical imaginary of these medications is co…
Digital Ethnobiology
During the last decades, under influence of globalization, the scope of ethnobiological research has expanded. Rapidly developing technology, telecommunication, the internet, and social media promote the occurrence and maintenance of ties within and between communities through multifaceted ways of digital communication. This often gives rise to digital or virtual communities in which knowledge, perspectives and ideas are shared. We want to highli…
Medicinal plants cultivated in urban home gardens in Heredia, Costa Rica
A disease like any other' traditional, complementary and alternative medicine use and perspectives in the context of Covid-19 among the Congolese community in Belgium
BackgroundAs a hard-hit area during the COVID-19 pandemic, Belgium knew the highest mortality among people from sub-Saharan African descent, compared to any other group living in the country. After migration, people often maintain traditional perceptions and habits regarding health and healthcare, resulting in a high prevalence of traditional, complementary and alternative medicine use among different migrant communities in northern urban setting…
From economic survival to recreation
BACKGROUND: There are many ethnobotanical studies on the use of wild plants and mushrooms for food and medicinal treatment in Europe. However, there is a lack of comparative ethnobotanical research on the role of non-wood forest products (NWFPs) as wild food and medicine in local livelihoods in countries with different socio-economic conditions. The aim of this study was to compare the present use of wild food and medicine in three places represe…
Identity in a medicine cabinet
A disease like any other' traditional, complementary and alternative medicine use and perspectives in the context of Covid-19 among the Congolese community in Belgium
BackgroundAs a hard-hit area during the COVID-19 pandemic, Belgium knew the highest mortality among people from sub-Saharan African descent, compared to any other group living in the country. After migration, people often maintain traditional perceptions and habits regarding health and healthcare, resulting in a high prevalence of traditional, complementary and alternative medicine use among different migrant communities in northern urban setting…
Assessing Provider Bias in General Practitioners’ Assessment and Referral of Depressive Patients with Different Migration Backgrounds
Mind the Gate
Plant use and perceptions in the context of sexual health among people of Congolese descent in Belgium
Background The use of medicinal plants is integral to global healthcare systems, with Sub-Saharan Africa maintaining a robust tradition of herbal medicine alongside Western-oriented healthcare. As migrant communities tend to continue traditional herbal practices after migration, documenting this use is vital to develop culturally sensitive healthcare. This study investigates plant usage and perspectives in the context of sexual and reproductive h…
Through a kaleidoscope
A higher prevalence of depression is found among patients with a migration background within the Belgian population. Nevertheless, this group is underrepresented in ambulant and residential mental health care services. Since general practitioners (GPs) have a crucial gatekeeping role, this led some researchers to investigate the possibility of a provider bias influencing GPs' assessment and referral of depressed patients with a migration backgrou…
And they slept happily ever after
Drawing on a critical social-psychological framework for discourse analysis, data from a popular forum for people over 50 were analysed to study how the habitual use of benzodiazepines and Z-drugs (BZD/Z) is discursively negotiated by Flemish older adults. We present five different repertoires (risk and addiction; alternative pathways; suffering; rationalisation; cessation) that illustrate how a pharmaceutical imaginary of these medications is co…
Medicinal plants cultivated in urban home gardens in Heredia, Costa Rica
The silver lining of greying
Contemporary ageing discourses and policies perceive being active as the key to a good later life and thereby focus on individual responsibility and self-care. Drawing on website articles and press releases of Belgian sickness fund agencies, this study analyses the ageing discourses and positioning of ageing persons of these organisations. A discourse analysis was performed using positioning theory to analyse how sickness fund agencies discursive…
From prescribing dilemma to knowledge in practice
School Matters
Cross-cultural adaptation in urban ethnobotany
Cross-cultural adaptation related to health care practices is a multifaceted process. Persistence, loss and incorporation of remedies into the Colombian folk pharmacopoeia after migration are influenced by practical adaptation strategies as well as by symbolic-cultural motives of ethnic identity
Resilience of Andean urban ethnobotanies
From economic survival to recreation
BACKGROUND: There are many ethnobotanical studies on the use of wild plants and mushrooms for food and medicinal treatment in Europe. However, there is a lack of comparative ethnobotanical research on the role of non-wood forest products (NWFPs) as wild food and medicine in local livelihoods in countries with different socio-economic conditions. The aim of this study was to compare the present use of wild food and medicine in three places represe…
Identity in a medicine cabinet
Ecosystem Services as (Co-)performative Practice
Assessing Provider Bias in General Practitioners’ Assessment and Referral of Depressive Patients with Different Migration Backgrounds
The silver lining of greying
Contemporary ageing discourses and policies perceive being active as the key to a good later life and thereby focus on individual responsibility and self-care. Drawing on website articles and press releases of Belgian sickness fund agencies, this study analyses the ageing discourses and positioning of ageing persons of these organisations. A discourse analysis was performed using positioning theory to analyse how sickness fund agencies discursive…
Mind the Gate
Digital Ethnobiology
During the last decades, under influence of globalization, the scope of ethnobiological research has expanded. Rapidly developing technology, telecommunication, the internet, and social media promote the occurrence and maintenance of ties within and between communities through multifaceted ways of digital communication. This often gives rise to digital or virtual communities in which knowledge, perspectives and ideas are shared. We want to highli…
Medicinal plants cultivated in urban home gardens in Heredia, Costa Rica
A disease like any other' traditional, complementary and alternative medicine use and perspectives in the context of Covid-19 among the Congolese community in Belgium
BackgroundAs a hard-hit area during the COVID-19 pandemic, Belgium knew the highest mortality among people from sub-Saharan African descent, compared to any other group living in the country. After migration, people often maintain traditional perceptions and habits regarding health and healthcare, resulting in a high prevalence of traditional, complementary and alternative medicine use among different migrant communities in northern urban setting…
Trends in the use of benzodiazepine receptor agonists among working-age adults in Belgium from 2004 to 2018
Introduction: The use of psychotropics, such as benzodiazepine receptor agonists (BzRAs), among working-age adults in Belgium has shown educational differences. However, it is unclear how work status plays a role in this relationship. Therefore, this research aims to investigate whether work status explains observed educational differences in BzRA use. In addition, considering medicalisation processes, where non-medical factors, such as work stat…
Athra,” a maternal illness in the rural Punjabi-Pakistan, as a source of stigma
Individual, interpersonal, and organisational factors associated with discrimination in medical decisions affecting people with a migration background with mental health problems
This paper showed that lower levels of trust among GPs' towards their migrant patients and high GP workloads contribute to an increased ethnic bias in medical decision-making. This may perpetuate ethnic inequalities in mental health care. Future researchers should develop an intervention to decrease the ethnic inequities in mental health care by addressing GPs' trust in their migrant and ethnic minority patients
From prescribing dilemma to knowledge in practice
And they slept happily ever after
Drawing on a critical social-psychological framework for discourse analysis, data from a popular forum for people over 50 were analysed to study how the habitual use of benzodiazepines and Z-drugs (BZD/Z) is discursively negotiated by Flemish older adults. We present five different repertoires (risk and addiction; alternative pathways; suffering; rationalisation; cessation) that illustrate how a pharmaceutical imaginary of these medications is co…
Risk, emotion and responsibility
Under processes of responsibilisation and individualisation in the ‘risk society’, as well as discourses of intensive motherhood, mothers are expected to make ‘good’ decisions regarding their children’s health. Consequently, decision-making concerning childhood vaccination becomes an emotionally challenging process, as mothers strive to minimise risk while simultaneously promoting and protecting health. Existing research shows that a substantial …
Healthcare Professionals’ Discursive Constructions of Parental Vaccine Hesitancy
Healthcare professionals play a crucial role in addressing the concerns of vaccine-hesitant parents since they form a trusted source for vaccine-related information. An increasing body of evidence suggests that healthcare professionals are faced with complexities when navigating the sensitive topic of parental vaccine hesitancy, as they balance their own vaccine- and context-specific concerns with institutional and societal pressures to vaccinate…
Plant use and perceptions in the context of sexual health among people of Congolese descent in Belgium
Background The use of medicinal plants is integral to global healthcare systems, with Sub-Saharan Africa maintaining a robust tradition of herbal medicine alongside Western-oriented healthcare. As migrant communities tend to continue traditional herbal practices after migration, documenting this use is vital to develop culturally sensitive healthcare. This study investigates plant usage and perspectives in the context of sexual and reproductive h…
Through a kaleidoscope
A higher prevalence of depression is found among patients with a migration background within the Belgian population. Nevertheless, this group is underrepresented in ambulant and residential mental health care services. Since general practitioners (GPs) have a crucial gatekeeping role, this led some researchers to investigate the possibility of a provider bias influencing GPs' assessment and referral of depressed patients with a migration backgrou…
Medicinal Plant Use Among the Congolese (Democratic Republic of Congo) Community in Belgium
Structural factors shaping health-seeking behaviour among breast cancer survivors in the Gaza Strip
This paper aims to analyse the enabling and disabling factors for health-seeking behaviour among Palestinian breast cancer survivors in the Gaza Strip. Specifically, it investigates how the availability of and accessibility to healthcare services influence health-seeking behaviour during the detection and treatment stages. The core components of the Right to Health—accessibility, availability, acceptability, and quality serve as the theoretical f…
The (Stigma) Power of Discourse
Mental health issues, such as depression, are prevalent in Belgium, particularly among individuals with a migration background. General practitioners (GPs) may inadvertently contribute to these disparities through unconscious biases and stereotypes. This study investigates how Belgian GPs’ accounts reflect, perpetuate, or resist stigmatization toward patients with a migration background experiencing mental health issues and how these accounts are…
Medicinal Plant Use and Diversity in the Urban Area of Idiofa, Democratic Republic of Congo
Medicinal plants are being used by communities worldwide to treat various conditions, diseases, and illnesses. Nevertheless, knowledge of their use is rapidly declining due to factors like accelerated urbanization, globalization, and biodiversity loss. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, deforestation, and urbanization are the main drivers of biodiversity loss. In order to gain insight into how urban communities in the Democratic Republic of Con…
Adolescents’ stigmatizing attitudes and social distance toward peers with depression
Mental health stigma poses a significant burden on affected individuals, particularly adolescents, who are especially vulnerable to its consequences. However, the processes and predictors of adolescent mental health stigma remain underexplored. Guided by the Etiology and Effects of Stigma model, this study examines a broad range of factors that shape mental health stigma in this population. Data were drawn from the Red Noses Culturally Sensitive …
Medicine (19 works) · Sociology (19 works) · Psychology (16 works) · Political science (14 works) · Geography (9 works) · Psychiatry (9 works) · Ethnobotanical and Medicinal Plants Studies (8 works) · Health care (8 works) · Mental health (7 works) · Migration, Health and Trauma (7 works)