We all face disease and death, and rely on the medical profession to extend our lives. Yet, David Wootton argues, from the fifth century BC until the 1930s, doctors actually did more harm than good. In this controversial new account of the history of medicine, he asks just how much good it has done us over the years, and how much harm it continues to do today.
Bad Medicine : Doctors Doing Harm Since Hippocrates
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Review
`Stimulating and unorthodox' Literary Review
`Anyone with an involvement with medicine - and that means anyone with a body and a brain - should read this brilliant, bracing and erudite book.' Seamus Sweeney, www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/001084.php
A genuinely thrilling adventure...An emotionally and intellectually gripping drama.
Explosive new book..important book
`A very stimulating and thought provoking book' Theodore Dalrymple, Sunday Telegraph
`Lucid [and] elegantly written... an inspiring account of individual accomplishment' Will Cohu, Daily Telegraph
`Anyone with an involvement with medicine - and that means anyone with a body and a brain - should read this brilliant, bracing and erudite book.' Seamus Sweeney, www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/001084.php
A genuinely thrilling adventure...An emotionally and intellectually gripping drama.
Explosive new book..important book
`A very stimulating and thought provoking book' Theodore Dalrymple, Sunday Telegraph
`Lucid [and] elegantly written... an inspiring account of individual accomplishment' Will Cohu, Daily Telegraph
About the Author
David Wootton is Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York. He has published widely in early modern intellectual history, particularly on the history of political thought, and is a regular reviewer for the London Review of Books and the Times Literary Supplement.
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More About the Author
David Wootton is an historian, author of Galileo: Watcher of the Skies, and Bad Medicine: Doctors Doing Harm Since Hippocrates. You can learn more about him at www.watcheroftheskies.org.
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26 of 27 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
We are proud of humanity's progress in medicine. We like our doctors; they are consistently among the professions that the public trusts the most. There are countless books on histories of medicine, citing a proud tradition from Hippocrates on down to the latest in gene therapy. Doctors gradually but eagerly advanced to take in new techniques and new science to get us where we are today. Except this did not happen. "For 2,400 years patients have believed that doctors were doing them good; for 2,300 years they were wrong." The unsparingly pessimistic view of the overwhelming failures of doctors is that of David Wootton, a professor of history who has written _Bad Medicine: Doctors Doing Harm Since Hippocrates_ (Oxford University Press). The world has adopted the scientific method as the way of getting information and using it, but before the dawn of germ theory, there was only a firm hold on medical traditions, and the traditions were wrong. Even worse, in many cases medical treatment became more dangerous over time, as in the case of nineteenth century hospitals causing the deaths of mothers in childbirth far more effectively than independent midwives could do. This is a grim story, and if we are past the centuries of medicine-as-tradition, there are still reasons to think that doctors may be addicted to doing the things they do because that's what they have always done.
For a couple of thousand years, medicine was based on Hippocrates and his successors, especially Galen, whose theories dealt with balancing bodily fluids, and to help nature along, doctors would induce vomiting or diarrhea, apply hot irons to the body, or drain off some blood. There was no physiological benefit in such treatments, which could do nothing but make things worse. Yet such treatments were the staple of medical practice until the middle of the nineteenth century. One reason is that people generally tend to be healthy, and when they are sick they generally tend to get well; bodies are designed to do this and do it fairly well, even without help (or hindrance) from medical treatment. Another reason is the placebo effect, which only got to be understood in the nineteenth century. A final and overwhelming reason for doctors' failure to move out of the tradition of treating humors was that having satisfied themselves that such treatment worked, and having formed a pattern of using it and taking fees for using it, they were much more interested, over many centuries, to preserve and transmit the tradition rather than to question or try to improve it. This was despite new understanding of, say, blood circulation, or the worlds of beasties revealed by the microscope.
Wootton's history is one of lost chances; medical science, he shows over and over, could have taken advantage of concepts known in biological science centuries beforehand, but did not do so. Doctors were, like any other group of people, set in their ways. They thought they had as good therapies as could be gotten, and so psychological and cultural factors kept medicine from advancing. It was not that there were gaps in equipment or pure science or intellectual resources, but bad arguments repeatedly drove out good and kept the status quo. It happened for centuries, and might happen in other ways in the future; a bit of skepticism on the parts of both doctors and patients could prove healthful.
For a couple of thousand years, medicine was based on Hippocrates and his successors, especially Galen, whose theories dealt with balancing bodily fluids, and to help nature along, doctors would induce vomiting or diarrhea, apply hot irons to the body, or drain off some blood. There was no physiological benefit in such treatments, which could do nothing but make things worse. Yet such treatments were the staple of medical practice until the middle of the nineteenth century. One reason is that people generally tend to be healthy, and when they are sick they generally tend to get well; bodies are designed to do this and do it fairly well, even without help (or hindrance) from medical treatment. Another reason is the placebo effect, which only got to be understood in the nineteenth century. A final and overwhelming reason for doctors' failure to move out of the tradition of treating humors was that having satisfied themselves that such treatment worked, and having formed a pattern of using it and taking fees for using it, they were much more interested, over many centuries, to preserve and transmit the tradition rather than to question or try to improve it. This was despite new understanding of, say, blood circulation, or the worlds of beasties revealed by the microscope.
Wootton's history is one of lost chances; medical science, he shows over and over, could have taken advantage of concepts known in biological science centuries beforehand, but did not do so. Doctors were, like any other group of people, set in their ways. They thought they had as good therapies as could be gotten, and so psychological and cultural factors kept medicine from advancing. It was not that there were gaps in equipment or pure science or intellectual resources, but bad arguments repeatedly drove out good and kept the status quo. It happened for centuries, and might happen in other ways in the future; a bit of skepticism on the parts of both doctors and patients could prove healthful.
Format:Paperback
This book is full of interesting information about the history of medicine and how much damage medicine still does today. This book is well researched and fascinating to read.
Romeo Richards,
How To Market And Manage A Private Medical Practice
Romeo Richards,
How To Market And Manage A Private Medical Practice
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By W. E. Baehr
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
Reading this book increased my lack of confidence in the competence of the medical industry. Author's conclusions about bad medicine seem to me to also apply to many other "professional" fields as well like education and law. Human nature loves not having to think and wallowing in ignorance no matter how dire the consequences. The most telling quote form the book was, "All the evidence suggests that the delay in formulating a practical germ theory has its origin not within microbiology but outside it. The chief obstacle was that doctors were satisfied with their existing therapies; the barriers to progress were psychological and cultural not intellectual."
Wootton, David (2006-06-22). Bad Medicine : Doctors Doing Harm Since Hippocrates (Kindle Locations 4222-4224). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.
They were satisfied with existing therapies no matter how often those therapies caused death and prevented progress. What satisfied therapies of the modern medical industry do you think may be causing deaths and preventing progress today?
Wootton, David (2006-06-22). Bad Medicine : Doctors Doing Harm Since Hippocrates (Kindle Locations 4222-4224). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.
They were satisfied with existing therapies no matter how often those therapies caused death and prevented progress. What satisfied therapies of the modern medical industry do you think may be causing deaths and preventing progress today?
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Better than I expected !
This was the first time I order a book online. I actually ordered 3 books from 3 different sellers & this seller was the first one to deliver my book. Read more
Published on August 1, 2009 by S. Alamr
4.0 out of 5 stars
bad medicine david wooton
Well researched and well written, informative and extremely accurate for a writer not in the medical profession
Published on December 6, 2007 by A. Zisos
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