A History of Medicine

Stressing major themes in the history of medicine, this Second Edition stimulates further exploration of the events, methodologies, and theories that shaped medical practices in decades past and in modern clinical practice-highlighting the practices of civilizations around the world, as well as the research of pioneering scientists and physicians who contributed to our current understanding of health and disease. Designed for survey courses in the history of medicine, this Second Edition presents a wide-ranging overview of Western medicine, as well as an introduction to the varied medical traditions of India and China provides additional chapters on the history of medicine in Pre-Columbian America and the evolution of medicine in the United States contains new sections on preventive and alternative medicine, medical education for women, miasma and contagion theories, the threat of epidemic disease, changing patterns of morbidity and mortality, public health and sanitary reforms, the high cost of medical care, diseases of affluence and aging, and the emergence of new diseases explores the concepts, theories, and diseases that illuminate medical history from paleopathology to prions