Public health has made our lives safer--but it often works behind the scenes, without our knowledge, that is, "while we are sleeping." This book powerfully illuminates how public health works with more than sixty success stories drawn from the area of injury and violence prevention. It also profiles dozens of individuals who have made important contributions to safety and health in a range of social arenas. Highlighting examples from the United States as well as from other countries, While We Were Sleeping will inform a wide audience of readers about what public health actually does and at the same time inspire a new generation to make the world a safer place.
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Editorial Reviews
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"Faculty teaching courses in injury prevention will find this a useful addition to their syllabi. . . . It also may help inspire the next generation of researchers and practitioners."--Injury Prevention
"This book is well written and shows that public health covers a lot of areas."--Annuals of Emergency Medicine
"This book is well written and shows that public health covers a lot of areas."--Annuals of Emergency Medicine
From the Inside Flap
"While We Were Sleeping brings the stories of injury prevention alive. The stories link research to successful advocacy for change and highlight the need to translate data--to put a face on it--in order to make change. These are stories of creativity, courage, and commitment."--Linda C. Degutis, DrPH, MSN, Yale University
"'While we were sleeping,' things were happening--good things!--that most of us were not aware of. Injuries of almost all kinds, to children, teenagers, elderly, disabled, and ordinary folks were being drastically reduced. David Hemenway documents this progress, some of it in the nineteenth century, most of it in our lifetimes, with analysis of what brought it about and, in some cases, who the heroes were. It's exhilarating to read--instructive and exhaustively documented by an author who has devoted a career to this kind of analysis." --Thomas C. Schelling, 2005 Nobel Laureate in Economics, Harvard University
"I wish I had written this book. It is astute, inspiring, full of fascinating ideas, and it shows precisely how success in public health is achieved. David Hemenway has given us a story of heroic grit and remarkable achievement--indeed, a whole compendium of reasons for optimism about what people and society can do."--Atul Gawande, author of Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance
"'While we were sleeping,' things were happening--good things!--that most of us were not aware of. Injuries of almost all kinds, to children, teenagers, elderly, disabled, and ordinary folks were being drastically reduced. David Hemenway documents this progress, some of it in the nineteenth century, most of it in our lifetimes, with analysis of what brought it about and, in some cases, who the heroes were. It's exhilarating to read--instructive and exhaustively documented by an author who has devoted a career to this kind of analysis." --Thomas C. Schelling, 2005 Nobel Laureate in Economics, Harvard University
"I wish I had written this book. It is astute, inspiring, full of fascinating ideas, and it shows precisely how success in public health is achieved. David Hemenway has given us a story of heroic grit and remarkable achievement--indeed, a whole compendium of reasons for optimism about what people and society can do."--Atul Gawande, author of Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A superb, instructive and uplifting book,
This review is from: While We Were Sleeping: Success Stories in Injury and Violence Prevention (Paperback)
This book is an excellent read for anyone who is searching for reasons to believe that public health activism can make a meaningful difference in our world. It is well-written, carefully researched, and has an intimate, accessible tone. I am going to recommend this book to all of my public health students and to my colleagues. I can easily imagine that I will be drawing information from it and referring to it time and time again for my own work. This is a much-needed contribution from an academic perspective, but also simply a fun read.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A service to the field and a good read for folks outside it,
This review is from: While We Were Sleeping: Success Stories in Injury and Violence Prevention (Paperback)
Dr. Hemenway, a professor of health policy at the Harvard School of Public Health, has done the field a real service with this book. The title comes from his favorite fairy tale, in which elves help a poor shoemaker by stitching beautiful pairs of shoes while he sleeps so that he may sell them by day and earn enough money to feed his family (and buy more leather for more shoes). The idea is that public health workers have been those unseen helpers who have assisted us all, without credit, without personal gain. Injuries have been reduced dramatically over the past century, but not by magic. Real people have labored hard to make it happen. Faculty teaching courses in injury prevention will find this a useful addition to their syllabi. If you work in public health, this book is also perfect to help your parent, partner or offspring understand what you do--and why you do it. It also may help inspire the next generation of researchers and practitioners so that we may all enjoy future gains in reducing the toll that injuries take.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Inspiring and motivating,
By Nancy S (West Virginia) - See all my reviews
This review is from: While We Were Sleeping: Success Stories in Injury and Violence Prevention (Paperback)
While We Were Sleeping is a thoroughly enjoyable read that highlights the successes and impact of injury prevention efforts over a broad spectrum of time and places. It will be inspiring and motivating to anyone in public health, and hopefully to those considering a career in the field of injury prevention or public health in general. It is a particularly unique work in that the stories provide solid examples of the often-immeasurable impact of prevention efforts. For those of us in the field who are experiencing increasing pressure to find ways to describe and substantiate the impact of injury prevention research and practice efforts, this book reinforces the value and reward of doing so; and in knowing we are making a difference.
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