Health and Healing in America

In Unit 2, we move from the face-to-face world of “social healers” and few scientifically-based opportunities for medical training to the beginnings of medical professionalism and modern scientific theories and concepts.

Here’s how things look for the next few weeks, up to Spring Break (weather permitting).

For Wednesday, Feb 20 read the essay from The Birth of the Clinic by French philosopher Michel Foucault (Course Reader). Fair warning: it’s challenging reading, so set aside time to really read it closely, probably several times over.

I’ve also included in the Course Reader my own “Cliff Notes” (Ok, “Hangen Notes”) to the Foucault reading, to help you read your way through it. Also, this movie clip from the 1993 Harrison Ford film The Fugitive applies – I mention it in my notes.

For our discussion in class, consider:

Whether the “discourses” Foucault talks about were necessary or simply incidental to the development of the health care systems he describes.

How the health care settings you might be familiar with now are similar to / different than the ones Foucault writes about. Are they all “clinics” in Foucault’s terms? Why or why not?

Examples you are familiar with, about how “the medical gaze” informs modern health care practice.

For Monday, Feb 25: Changing Ideas and Practices. Read Chapter 3 in Burnham’s book, “Changing Ideas and Practices,” and Henry Jacob Bigelow’s article documenting first use of anesthesia in surgery at Mass General Hospital in 1846.
Reminder: Diagnosis History Paper due today, by classtime.

Links:
Boston Dentist Demonstrates Ether, Moments in Massachusetts History
Interactive History of Anesthesia (Wood Library Museum of Anesthesiology)

Think:

How does Foucault’s essay help frame or illuminate Burnham’s description of what happened to make medicine more “modern”?

How was observation and “the gaze” important to Bigelow’s approach to surgical innovation?

For Wednesday, Feb 27: Inventing Modern Medicine. Read Chapters 4 and 5 of Porter, Blood and Guts and Chapter 4 of Burnham’s History

Links:
Koch’s Postulates (Vaccines History, The College of Physicians of Philadelphia)
Typhoid Mary (Youtube)
Quack Cures and Self Remedies: Patent Medicine (Digital Public Library of America)
Lydia Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound (ASU Embryo Project Encyclopedia)

For Monday, March 4: Germ Theory and Surgery. Read Chapters 6 and 7 of Porter, Blood and Guts and Chapters 5 and 6 of Burnham’s History.

For Wednesday, March 6: Progressive Era Public Health. Read Chapter 7 of Burnham’s History. Response Journal #2 is due on Blackboard.