Secular values and the location of religion: a spatial analysis of an English medical centre

What do contemporary controversies in healthcare reveal about secular values and the location of religion within an English medical centre? Using a socio-spatial methodology designed to break open ideological perspectives and normative values, we analyse the doctor-patient relationship, complementary and alternative medicine, and an issue that bridges the two, evidence-based medicine. In the physical, social and mental spaces of the medical centre we uncover the traces of religious activity and roles and of alternative therapeutic regimes often informed by spiritual or religious systems. Furthermore we disclose the heterogeneity of values that comprise the secular worldview of one group of contemporary general practitioners