This paper reports findings from an ethnographic study of self-care behaviors and illness concepts among Mexican-American @entity2175 ( @entity2175 ) @entity1 . Open-ended interviews were conducted with 49 @entity2175 @entity1 from two public hospital outpatient clinics in South Texas. They are self-identified Mexican-Americans who have had @entity2175 for at least 1 yr, and have no @entity73 due to @entity2175 . Interviews focused on their concepts and experiences in managing their illness and their self-care behaviors. Clinical assessment of their @entity413 control was also extracted from their medical records. The texts of @entity1 interviews were content analyzed through building and refining thematic matrixes focusing on their causal explanations and treatment behaviors. We found @entity1 ' causal explanations of their illness often are driven by an effort to connect the illness in a direct and specific way to their personal history and their past experience with treatments. While most cite biomedically accepted causes such as heredity and diet, they elaborate these concepts into personally relevant constructs by citing Provoking Factors, such as behaviors or events. Their causal models are thus both specific to their personal history and consistent with their experiences with treatment success or failure. Based on these findings, we raise a critique of the Locus of Control Model of treatment behavior prevalent in the @entity6 education literature. Our analysis suggests that a sense that one's own behavior is important to the disease onset may reflect @entity1 ' evaluation of their experience with treatment outcomes, rather than determining their level of activity in treatment.

Porque me toc   a mi? Mexican American @entity6 XXXX ' causal stories and their relationship to treatment behaviors.

@entity2175 :: ('MESH:D003924', 'Disease') :: ['non-insulin dependent diabetes mellitus', 'NIDDM'] @entity1 :: ('9606', 'Species') :: ['patients', 'patient'] @entity6 :: ('MESH:D003920', 'Disease') :: ['diabetes'] @entity73 :: ('MESH:D003072', 'Disease') :: ['major impairment'] @entity413 :: ('MESH:D005947', 'Chemical') :: ['glucose']
@entity1 :: (9606,Species) :: ['patients']
