Medical sociologists have long recognized the importance of community and family structure in the health of individuals. However, the past quarter century in America has seen an increasing emphasis on individualism and materialism that has effectively diminished the cohesiveness and emotional support provided by these basic social units. The Power of Clan examines the health effects of social change in a largely Italian-American town over a twenty-five-year period and provides substantial ...

The French physiologist Claude Bernard was responisble for investigating the chemical phenomena of digestion. This text reproduces his research into experimental medicine. A new introduction looks at his impact on the world of medicine.

Roseto is a small Italian-American community in east-central Pennsylvania. This fifteen-year study drawing on medical histories, physical examinations, and laboratory tests, compared a large sample of Rosetans to inhabitants of two neighboring communities, Bangor and Nazareth, and followed up this research with a sociological study of the three communities.Despite a greater prevalence of obesity in Roseto, and despite similar dietary, smoking, and exercise habits and similar ethnic...

At a time when medical care for the people of the United States is undergoing wrenching change due mainly to vast and costly technological progress, doctors have had to cede much of their initiative and responsibility to third parties. Medicine has become a commercial enterprise. Patients must affiliate themselves with a managed health care organization in order to have access to their doctors. In the hurly-burly of today's techno-medicine, many physicians are too busy to spend time in dia...

This volume contains the edited transcript of the third Totts Gap Colloquium held at Totts Gap, Pennsylvania, June 14-16, 1976. The Colloquium was aimed at sensing and evaluating anticipated pat terns of medical responsibility and practice and preparing for im minent change - specifically as it will concern the role of the doctor. Recognizing that community values and social behavior are powerful forces affecting health, the participants explored ways in which the physician and the rest of...

This volume contains the edited proceedings of a Totts Gap Colloquium held June 15 to 17, 1980 at Totts Gap Medical Research Laboratories in Bangor, Pennsylvania under the sponsorship of three neighboring community hospitals in the Lehigh Valley; St. Luke's Hospital of Bethlehem, Easton Hospital of Easton and Muhlenberg Medical Center of Bethlehem. The objective of the meeting was to examine from several points of view the impact of rapidly proliferating technology on medical education, pr...

This volume contains the edited transcript of the second Totts Gap Colloquium, held at Totts Gap, Pennsylvania, May 29-31, 1975. The objective of the Colloquium was to bring into focus what is known of pathogenic mechanisms of schizophrenic manifestations. One hope was to differentiate among syndromes that share the fea~ tures of schizophrenia, disorganization of thought and talk, inap propriateness of affect, circumstantiality, withdrawal from social interaction, paranoid ideation, halluc...

What is epidemiology? What are the causes of a new disease? How can pandemics be prevented? Epidemiology is the study of the changing patterns of disease and its main aim is to improve the health of populations. It's a vital field, central to the health of society, to the identification of causes of disease, and to their management and prevention. Epidemiology has had an impact on many areas of medicine; from discovering the relationship between tobacco smoking and lung cancer, to the orig...

This book is the principal account of epidemiology's role in the development of effective measures to identify, prevent, and treat diseases. Throughout history, epidemiologists have challenged conventional knowledge, elucidating mysteries of causality and paving the way for remedies. From the outbreak of the bubonic plague, cholera, and cancer to the search for an effective treatment of AIDS and the origins of Alzheimer's disease, epidemiological thought has been crucial in shaping our und...

Every year, the average American spends about $7,300 on medical expenses. The typical Canadian pays $2,700, the Briton only $2,000. And yet, according to the World Health Organization, our healthcare system, in terms of total quality, ranks thirty-eighth in the world, right between Costa Rica and Slovenia. Not only do 40 million Americans lack health insurance, but more than 200,000 die each year because of medical mistakes. Our average life expectancy is lower than Cuba's. In Next Med...

Landmarks series is an attempt to piece together and chronicle the multi-prong approach to the different specialty areas of diseases that has resulted in the understanding and above all conquest of human health. It is a tribute to the hundreds of scientists, technologists and physicians who contributed to the making of medicine as it is understood today. Landmarks in Stroke is an attempt to spotlight a few pioneers and contributors who have made a difference to the study and understanding ...

Nortin M. Hadler knows backaches. For more than three decades as a physician and medical researcher, he has studied the experience of low back pain in people who are otherwise healthy. Hadler terms the low back pain that everyone suffers at one time or another “regional back pain.” In this book, he addresses the history and treatment of the ailment with the healthy skepticism that has become his trademark, taking the “Hadlerian” approach to backaches and the backache treatment industry in ...