Although articles in this volume fall into three thematic clusters, each of those groups exemplifies three general themes: micro-social processes; innovations and the question of continuity versus discontinuity; and the relationship between ideas and practice. Most of these essays touch upon, and some of them are exclusively concerned with, small scale social processes: e.g. the routines of the all-female early-modern childbirth ritual, the different ways that male practitioners were summoned to such occasions, the functioning of voluntary hospitals, the protocols underlying patient records. Such social practices are well worth studying as both the sites and drivers of larger-scale historical change. Whenever there comes into being something new - whether an institution (a hospital), a social practice (the summoning of men as midwives) or a concept (a new approach to disease) - the question arises as to its relationship with what went before. This concept resonates throughout these essays, but is most to the fore in the chapters on early Hanoverian London (which asks explanatory questions) and on Porter versus Foucault (who represent the extremes of continuity and discontinuity respectively). A couple of generations ago, the ’history of ideas’ was pursued largely without reference to practice; in recent times, the danger has appeared of the very reverse taking place. This book ranges across a broad spectrum in this respect, the emphasis being sometimes upon practice (Eleanor Willughby’s work as a midwife) and sometimes upon ideas (concepts of pleurisy across the centuries); but in every case there is at least the potential for relating the two to one another. None of these themes is specific to medical history; on the contrary, they are the bread-and-butter of historical reconstruction in general.

The COVID-19 pandemic provides stark evidence of the importance of medicine on a global scale. However, revisiting the influenza pandemic of 1918 provided a perspective as we searched for a viable vaccine and instituted public health measures. This shows that medical knowledge is an accumulative process extending to the past and it is in the spirit of that legacy that this bibliography has been compiled. The book is a one-stop resource that cites literature related to the historical aspects of medicine. It also acknowledges medicine’s global reach and devotes significant effort in that respect. Although the online world seems to dominate on both a social and educational level, there is still a need for thoughtfully curated and focused reference works and this bibliography accomplishes that goal. The book has 9,000+ citations. It utilizes the WHO's International classification of Diseases for the section on diseases and disorders and the U.S. Food & Drug Administration's Product Code Classification Database for the section on medical devices, equipment, and instruments. It includes detailed subject, geographuc, and people indexes for an easy reference.

Although articles in this volume fall into three thematic clusters, each of those groups exemplifies three general themes: micro-social processes; innovations and the question of continuity versus discontinuity; and the relationship between ideas and practice. Most of these essays touch upon, and some of them are exclusively concerned with, small scale social processes: e.g. the routines of the all-female early-modern childbirth ritual, the different ways that male practitioners were summoned to such occasions, the functioning of voluntary hospitals, the protocols underlying patient records. Such social practices are well worth studying as both the sites and drivers of larger-scale historical change. Whenever there comes into being something new - whether an institution (a hospital), a social practice (the summoning of men as midwives) or a concept (a new approach to disease) - the question arises as to its relationship with what went before. This concept resonates throughout these essays, but is most to the fore in the chapters on early Hanoverian London (which asks explanatory questions) and on Porter versus Foucault (who represent the extremes of continuity and discontinuity respectively). A couple of generations ago, the ’history of ideas’ was pursued largely without reference to practice; in recent times, the danger has appeared of the very reverse taking place. This book ranges across a broad spectrum in this respect, the emphasis being sometimes upon practice (Eleanor Willughby’s work as a midwife) and sometimes upon ideas (concepts of pleurisy across the centuries); but in every case there is at least the potential for relating the two to one another. None of these themes is specific to medical history; on the contrary, they are the bread-and-butter of historical reconstruction in general.

Originally published in 1992 Medical Journals and Medical Knowledge examines both broad developments in print and media and the practice of particular journals such as the British Medical Journal. The book is the first study to address these questions and to examine the impact of regular news on the making of the medical community. The book considers the rise of the medical press, and looks at how it recorded and described principal developments and so promoted medical science and enhanced medical consciousness. This book was a seminal work when first published and was one of the first to consider the importance of the roots of medical journalism, editorial practices and the ways in which the medical journalism altered the world of medicine.

Prior to the nineteenth century, the practice of medicine in the Western world was as much art as science. But, argues W. F. Bynum, 'modern' medicine as practiced today is built upon foundations that were firmly established between 1800 and the beginning of World War I. He demonstrates this in terms of concepts, institutions, and professional structures that evolved during this crucial period, applying both a more traditional intellectual approach to the subject and the newer social perspectives developed by recent historians of science and medicine. In a wide-ranging survey, Bynum examines the parallel development of biomedical sciences such as physiology, pathology, bacteriology, and immunology, and of clinical practice and preventive medicine in nineteenth-century Europe and North America. Focusing on medicine in the hospitals, the community, and the laboratory, Bynum contends that the impact of science was more striking on the public face of medicine and the diagnostic skills of doctors than it was on their actual therapeutic capacities.

Nostalgia today is seen as essentially benign, a wistful longing for the past. This wasn't always the case, however: from the late seventeenth century through the end of the nineteenth, nostalgia denoted a form of homesickness so extreme that it could sometimes be deadly. What Nostalgia Was unearths that history. Thomas Dodman begins his story in Basel, where a nineteen-year-old medical student invented the new diagnosis, modeled on prevailing notions of melancholy. From there, Dodman traces its spread through the European republic of letters and into Napoleon's armies, as French soldiers far from home were diagnosed and treated for the disease. Nostalgia then gradually transformed from a medical term to a more expansive cultural concept, one that encompassed Romantic notions of the aesthetic pleasure of suffering. But the decisive shift toward its contemporary meaning occurred in the colonies, where Frenchmen worried about racial and cultural mixing came to view moderate homesickness as salutary. An afterword reflects on how the history of nostalgia can help us understand the transformations of the modern world, rounding out a surprising, fascinating tour through the history of a durable idea.

Against the backdrop of unprecedented concern for the future of health care, 'The Cambridge History of Medicine' surveys the rise of medicine in the West from classical times to the present. Covering both the social and scientific history of medicine, this volume traces the chronology of key developments and events.