Publisher's Synopsis
In the often triumphal history of medicine, doctors are seen as heroes, and we revere them, but patients are rarely mentioned. Patients are usually portrayed as passive recipients of medical and nursing care. For the most part, patients are not viewed as active partners in medical care and certainly not as contributors to the advances in medicine or in healthcare. A Patient's History of Medicine looks at the history of medicine from the patient's perspective. Its focus is both historical and philosophical. When someone becomes ill, we, as patients, and our families choose between doctors and other health practitioners. This choice has had little place in the formal history of medicine: for academic practitioners all non-doctors were quacks. Dr. Glouberman considers the successes and failures of the choices we make for care and how that has affected the history of medicine. He also considers carefully the search for alternative medicine that has always been and continues to be part of the healthcare environment. Glouberman also explores the changing ideas about the nature of human health.
