Blood and Guts: A Short History of Medicine / Edition 1

by Roy Porter

Overview

"Ideas tumble out of Porter like wonders from some scholarly horn of plenty." —Sherwin B. Nuland, The New Republic

An eminently readable, entertaining romp through the history of our vain and valiant efforts to heal ourselves. Mankind's battle to stay alive and healthy for as long as possible is our oldest, most universal struggle. With his characteristic wit and vastly informed historical scope, Roy Porter examines the war fought between disease and doctors on the battleground of the flesh from ancient times to the present. He explores the many ingenious ways in which we have attempted to overcome disease through the ages: the changing role of doctors, from ancient healers, apothecaries, and blood-letters to today's professionals; the array of drugs, from Ayurvedic remedies to the launch of Viagra; the advances in surgery, from amputations performed by barbers without anesthetic to today's sophisticated transplants; and the transformation of hospitals from Christian places of convalescence to modern medical powerhouses. Cleverly illustrated with historic line drawings, the chronic ailments of humanity provide vivid anecdotes for Porter's enlightening story of medicine's efforts to prevail over a formidable and ever-changing adversary.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393325690
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	06/17/2004
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Roy Porter (1946—2002) was professor of the history of medicine at University College, London. His books include Blood and Guts, The Creation of the Modern World, Flesh in the Age of Reason, and The Greatest Benefit to Mankind, winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Award.

What People are Saying About This

John R. Stilgoe

[The book] . . .takes a Darwinian view of an elusive city, treating it as both habitat and evolving organism. . . .a stunningly successful look at London between the Elizabeths. -- The New York Times Book Review

Editorial Reviews

"A delightful and informative introduction to an important subject by one of the outstanding scholars of his generation."

New England Journal of Medicine - Gerald N. Grob

"A short, brilliant survey of medicine—its blood and guts—from antiquity to today."

Richmond Times-Dispatch - Deborah Love

"Porter weaves together...plenty of anecdotes and illustrations with an easy, informal writing style."

Booklist - Donna Chavez

Some histories are simply too long for a short treatment, as this engaging but cursory volume demonstrates. Each chapter takes on various subtopics in the history of Western medicine: disease, doctors, the body, the laboratory, therapies, surgery, the hospital, and medicine and modern society. Porter, who died in 2002, cleverly uses this scheme to discuss major developments in rough chronological order: for example, in "The Body," he explains that important advances in anatomy preceded the evolution of the modern laboratory. The book derives from lectures in the social history of medicine that he gave at Wellcome Institute at University College, London. Even on the printed page he maintains a conversational tone that makes the topic wholly accessible. And his sometimes incisive observations go beyond the purely medical: "politicians... have been able to look to improved health care as a carrot to dangle before the electorate. Votes were to be had not just in bread and circuses but in beds and surgery." But too often such social analysis is sidelined by a rapid-fire recitation of dates, practitioners' names and fleeting references to their contributions. Porter clearly knew and loved his subject, but he could not bring himself to part with some of the trees to paint a clearer picture of the forest. (May) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Author of the magisterial The Greatest Benefit to Mankind, Porter traces Medicine from the ancients to Viagra. Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

Capsule version of the late Porter's hefty and masterly medical history, The Greatest Benefit to Mankind (1998), still chock-full of astonishing facts and fascinating illustrations. While his earlier work was aimed primarily at students of medicine, like those who attended his lectures at University College London, Porter trimmed this one for the general reader before his death in 2002. His subject is Western medicine, and he begins by looking at how the diseases that afflict humanity have changed from the days of prehistoric hunter-gatherers through the rise of agricultural settlements and great cities to the Industrial Revolution and the present era of global trade. Next, he surveys healing practices from the magic of tribal shamans through the Hippocratic doctors of ancient Greece to modern-day specialists. An Olympian researcher and entertaining storyteller, Porter reveals how investigation of the body itself changed thinking about disease and laid the foundations for 19th-century clinical medicine, then examines that century's organized laboratory investigations, which led to the development of modern biomedical sciences and the pharmaceutical breakthroughs of the 20th century. Surgery, at one time performed by barbers without anesthesia, gets a separate chapter that traces its development from crude amputations to organ transplants. Porter shows hospitals evolving from charitable institutions providing the poor with refuge and care to hubs of modern medicine and the power bases of a medical elite. Along the way, we meet Iri, Keeper of the Royal Rectum in ancient Egypt, examine a diagram of the first wooden stethoscope, and learn how William Harvey worked out the circulation ofblood. In conclusion, Porter notes that expectations of what modern medicine can achieve have grown alongside dissatisfaction with the impersonal, systematized delivery of health care services. Whatever the 21st century holds for medicine, he assures us, it will be different from the past. Surprisingly light and lively, for anyone interested in discovering how the healing arts became a science and a business. (38 b&w illustrations)

Kirkus Reviews