The Alarming History of Medicine: Amusing Anecdotes from Hippocrates to Heart Transplants [Paperback]

Richard Gordon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 15, 1997

Delightfully witty and richly informative, The Alarming History of Medicine is a collection of anecdotes describing how the historical breakthroughs in medicine were really made. Using hilarious stories, based on actual facts, Richard Gordon shows that most of the monumental discoveries were originally accidents.

A must-read for hypochondriacs, doctors, medical students, and anyone fascinated by the world of medicine, The Alarming History of Medicine is clever, revealing--and all true.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Best known for his novels, particularly Doctor in the House , Gordon here presents unusual insights into medical advances. Although noting that "Religion is of course a Good Thing, offering the valuable incidentals of saddling assertive man with someone more important than himself . . . it scuppered healing for fifteen centuries." That being the case, Gordon's irreverent, witty and rich florilegium of medical milestones is largely confined to the last couple of centuries. He demonstrates that many medical milestones resulted from fallacies, luck or serendipity--citing the role of barbers and warfare in promoting surgery--and that forgotten laboratory bacterial specimens led to a cholera vaccine and the discovery of penicillin. According to Gordon, Darwin, a non-doctor, "founded genetics knowing nothing about DNA," and industrial chemist Pasteur stumbled on the microbes leading to pasteurization and vaccination while investigating adulterated wine and beer. The instructive, entertaining lode of superstitions and facts inludes hilarious suggested origins for the word condom and an apt takeoff on Freud treating a patient. Illustrations.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Gordon--author of a successfully filmed series of British comic novels that began with Doctor in the House; of many delightful articles in Punch; and of books on fishing, cricket, and gardening besides medical topics--has hit the mark again. He deals wittily and informatively with the past as well as the present in this set of anecdotes on some of medicine's great achievements and achievers. Regarding the former, he points out that "among the greatest discoveries of medicine are the generally belated ones that some treatments are utterly useless." As for the latter, Gordon takes up such well-known individuals as Joseph Lister, discoverer and champion of the antiseptic method, who once cut into an abscess in Queen Victoria's left armpit, thereby allowing him to observe upon her death (not from the lancing) that "I am the only man who has ever stuck a knife into the Queen." He notes that Thomas Bowdler, more famous for cleaning up Shakespeare, was a physician. The book is not, however, just trivial anecdote and humor, since Gordon knows enough about the field to realize that Villemin showed that tuberculosis was infectious 14 years before Koch did. The occasional Briticism may cause a momentary stumble for the American reader but in no way lessens the pleasures of this text. ^IWilliam Beatty --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; 1 edition (September 15, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312167636
• ISBN-13: 978-0312167639
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,024,638 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Light and funny, by fermed, May 1, 2000

By 

Fernando Melendez "fermed" (San Diego, California USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Alarming History of Medicine: Amusing Anecdotes from Hippocrates to Heart Transplants (Paperback)

Richard Gordon is a physician, a writer and a humorist. His history of medicine is, indeed, alarming. It was not so much what wasn't known that mattered, but what physicians thought they knew and did not. The book is light and quick paced. At times I wished Gordon had quit trying to be funny and had spent a little more time expounding on his massive knowledge of medicine and its history. I am not an expert in this field, but I did make an effort to check some of his facts...and he was right on target. The book is packed with medical trivia and funny gossip (sometimes horrible gossip) about its practitioners. Much of the information is astonishing if not alarming. The book lacks an index, which is infuriating and should be forbidden in these days of computers. It does have a few pages of references. In all I thoroughly enjoyed reading it, and I certainly learned a great deal of new and interesting facts, despite the author's obsession with the quick, witty phrase.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Horrible, May 30, 2004

By 

wizardsheart "wizardsheart" (Michigan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Alarming History of Medicine (Paperback)

Richard Gordon is very witty. However, this book is poorly written and badly organized. There were also a lot of misspellings and other errors which should of been caught in editing. He wanders all over the place and assumes that you are familiar with the history of medicine. I am not, which is why I bought the book. Don't read this book unless you already know the history of medicine or you enjoy being frustrated.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars colouring in of medical history, January 15, 2004

By 

telelover (milan, italy) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Alarming History of Medicine: Amusing Anecdotes from Hippocrates to Heart Transplants (Paperback)

I am fascinated by this subject, hence the reason for my reading this book, and I happen to be British, hence my appreciation of Richard Gordon's humour. After having read numerous histories of medicine and surgery for both my professional and personal interests, I can honestly say that I was finally able to see many of the famous names as people. I loved the parts about the condom laundry and the fact that we humans, along with cows, are physically responsible for the hole in the ozone layer. Just two examples that spring to mind from this mine of humorously viewed information. Informative and a damn good laugh.