Medical America History

For readers of Mary Roach and Jared Diamond, an innovative look at the histories of different epidemics and what it meant for society, alongside what lessons different diseases have to teach us as society battles the novel coronavirus. Throughout history, there have been numerous epidemics that...

One hundred years ago, a mysterious and alarming illness spread across America's South, striking tens of thousands of victims. No one knew what caused it or how to treat it. People were left weak, disfigured, insane, and in some cases, dead.

Invalid teenager Leroy Wiley Gresham left a seven-volume diary spanning the years of secession and the Civil War. He was just 12 when he began, and he died at 17, just weeks after the war ended. LeRoy’s diary offers an inside look at a fateful journey that robbed an energetic and likeable young man of his youth and life. I Am Perhaps Dying adds considerably to the medical literature by increasing our understanding of how tuberculosis attacked a young body over time, how it was treated in the middle 19th century, and the effectiveness of those treatments.

Salk became a cultural hero and icon for a whole generation. Now, at the fiftieth anniversary of the first national vaccination program, and as humanity is tantalizingly close to eradicating polio worldwide, comes this unforgettable chronicle. Salk's work was an unparalleled achievement, and it makes for a magnificent listen.

JFK's Secret Doctor tells a thrilling story of adventure and a historic medical career. Set against the grand panorama of 20th century world events, it captures the remarkable life and spirit of climber and medical visionary Hans Kraus (1905–1996). Kraus was taught English by writer James Joyce, escaped Nazi-dominated Europe, and was JFK's secret back specialist.

In this "powerful and unflinching page-turner" (New York Times), a healthcare journalist examines the science, history, and culture of breast cancer. As a health-care journalist, Kate Pickert knew the emotional highs and lows of medical treatment well -- but always from a distance, through the...

Who is considered most at risk for diabetes, and why? In this thorough, engaging book, historian Arleen Tuchman examines and critiques how these questions have been answered by both the public and medical communities for over a century in the United States. Beginning in the late 19th century, Tuchman describes how at different times Jews, middle-class whites, American Indians, African Americans, and Hispanic Americans have been labeled most at risk for developing diabetes, and that such claims have reflected and perpetuated troubling assumptions about race, ethnicity, and class.

How earnest hippies, frightened parents, suffering patients, and other ordinary Americans went to war over marijuana In the last five years, eight states have legalized recreational marijuana. To many, continued progress seems certain. But pot was on a similar trajectory forty years ago, only to...

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A business leader and esteemed economic thinker outlines simple solutions to America’s five most pressing public policy issues, from healthcare to education to inequality. America today confronts a host of urgent problems, many of them seemingly intractable, but...

A psychiatrist and award-winning documentarian sheds light on the mental-health-care crisis in the United States. When Dr. Kenneth Rosenberg trained as a psychiatrist in the late 1980s, the state mental hospitals, which had reached peak occupancy in the 1950s, were being closed at an alarming...

After traveling 60 miles on horseback through snow to the Crawford cabin, Dr. Ephraim McDowell examines his patient. He realizes that he is not dealing with an overdue pregnancy, but an enlarged ovarian cyst. He gives the patient the grim news that he can do nothing to save her. She begs him to try to remove the life-threatening tumor.