mate when i was training to be rnmh one thing they stressed above anything was that mental handicap definitely is not a medical condition in fact one of the main things taught to us was that the medical model was a poor model for the care of mentally handicapped people because the model is based on treatment and mentally handicapped people cannot be cured a model based on normalisation or social role valorization is more appropriate how can such a vast collecion of disorders abilities be a single medical condition i don't mean to be contrary and must admit to having left the profession some years ago jun utc