An engaging history of the role that George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin played in the origins of public health in America. Before the advent of modern antibiotics, one’s life could be abruptly shattered by contagion and death, and debility from infectious diseases and epidemics was commonplace for early Americans, regardless of social status. Concerns over health affected the Founding Fathers and their families as it did slaves, merchants, immigrants, and everyone else in North America. As both victims of illness and national leaders, the Founders occupied a unique position regarding the development of public health in America. Historian Jeanne E. Abrams’s Revolutionary Medicine refocuses the study of the lives of George and Martha Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John and Abigail Adams, and James and Dolley Madison away from politics to the perspective of sickness, health, and medicine. For the Founders, republican ideals fostered a reciprocal connection between individual health and the “health” of the nation. Studying the encounters of these American Founders with illness and disease, as well as their viewpoints about good health, not only provides a richer and more nuanced insight into their lives, but also opens a window into the practice of medicine in the eighteenth century, which is at once intimate, personal, and first hand. Today’s American public health initiatives have their roots in the work of America’s Founders, for they recognized early on that government had compelling reasons to shoulder some new responsibilities with respect to ensuring the health and well-being of its citizenry—beginning the conversation about the country’s state of medicine and public healthcare that continues to be a work in progress.

Nearly nine times as many died from diseases during the American Revolution as did from wounds. Poor diet, inadequate sanitation and sometimes a lack of basic medical care caused such diseases as dysentery, scurvy, typhus, smallpox and others to decimate the ranks. Scurvy was a major problem for both the British and American navies, while venereal diseases proved to be a particularly vexing problem in New York. Respiratory diseases, scabies and other illnesses left nearly 4,000 colonial troops unable to fight when George Washington's troops broke camp at Valley Forge in June 1778. From a physician's perspective, this is a unique history of the American Revolution and how diseases impacted the execution of the war effort. The medical histories of Washington and King George III are also provided.

A professor of medicine reveals how technology like wireless internet, individual data, and personal genomics can be used to save lives.

A prismatic examination of the evolution of medicine, from a trade to a science, through the exemplary lives of ten men and women. Johns Hopkins University, one of the preeminent medical schools in the nation today, has played a unique role in the history of medicine. When it first opened its doors in 1893, medicine was a rough-and-ready trade. It would soon evolve into a rigorous science. It was nothing short of a revolution. This transition might seem inevitable from our vantage point today. In recent years, medical science has mapped the human genome, deployed robotic tools to perform delicate surgeries, and developed effective vaccines against a host of deadly pathogens. But this transformation could not have happened without the game-changing vision, talent, and dedication of a small cadre of individuals who were willing to commit body and soul to the advancement of medical science, education, and treatment. A Scientific Revolution recounts the stories of John Shaw Billings, Max Brödel, Mary Elizabeth Garrett, William Halsted, Jesse Lazear, Dorothy Reed Mendenhall, William Osler, Helen Taussig, Vivien Thomas, and William Welch. This chorus of lives tells a compelling tale not just of their individual struggles, but how personal and societal issues went hand-in-hand with the advancement of medicine.

"Excellent…Tucker’s chronicle of the world of 17th-century science in London and Paris is fascinating." —The Economist In December 1667, maverick physician Jean Denis transfused calf’s blood into one of Paris’s most notorious madmen. Days later, the madman was dead and Denis was framed for murder. A riveting exposé of the fierce debates, deadly politics, and cutthroat rivalries behind the first transfusion experiments, Blood Work takes us from dissection rooms in palaces to the streets of Paris, providing an unforgettable portrait of an era that wrestled with the same questions about morality and experimentation that haunt medical science today.

A leading orthopedic surgeon and a top sports chiropractor team up to offer a groundbreaking new approach to remaining injury-free and recovering from injury faster. Muscle injuries are not just for sports superstars anymore. Back, shoulder, hip, and knee problems bedevil more and more people than ever before. Muscle Medicine provides a way to prevent such injuries from happening and to treat them when they do without drugs or surgery. The product of a collaborative effort between two widely recognized authorities on sports injuries, Muscle Medicine relies on cutting-edge medical and therapeutic expertise to deliver what many doctors cannot: explanations of how to maintain good muscle health, how to treat common muscle injuries, such as “Tennis Elbow” and “Cell Phone Neck,” and how to determine when joint surgery is and is not necessary for some common orthopedic problems. By focusing on the health of our muscles, we can prevent many sports injuries from occurring and recover faster from the ones that do, say the coauthors, whose A-list clients have included John McEnroe and Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Featuring more than 100 illustrations that show the basics of muscle mechanics, along with various stretching, strengthening, and self-treatment exercises, Muscle Medicine will help readers enjoy pain-free, active lives no matter what their age or activity level.

Essays by leading researchers on the nature and genesis of laboratory medicine.

A look at the future of medicine based on cutting-edge stem cell research • Shares Dr. Biava’s groundbreaking research on stem cell differentiation stage factors (SCDSFs) as a cellular “reprogramming” treatment for cancer and other degenerative diseases • Explains how SCDSFs restore communication between cells and the epigenetic code, the information that programs the normal function and growth of every living cell • Explores how the universe operates like a cosmic information-network and how this new scientific worldview will shape the future of healing and medicine The universe is not a mechanical system of matter--it operates like a cosmic network that runs on and is connected by information. Information “in-forms” and underlies all of the physical world, including the human body. In this book, Pier Mario Biava, M.D., and Ervin Laszlo, Ph.D., show how this “information” worldview can be applied to healing and medicine and, specifically, how it underlies a revolutionary new approach to cancer and disease treatment, one that works directly with the epigenetic code--the information that programs the function and growth of every living cell. The authors explain how tumor growth and cellular dysfunction are manifestations of disconnections in the information network of an organism. Unveiling Dr. Biava’s groundbreaking research on stem cell differentiation stage factors (SCDSFs), they explain how SCDSFs work directly as epigenetic regulators to reconnect aberrant cells to the body’s information network and reset them to their original function--in the case of cancer cells transforming them from malignant to benign, from dysfunction back to normalcy and health. Dr. Biava’s research on SCDSFs--derived from Zebrafish embryos, which have a very high percentage of proteins identical with those of human beings--has shown good success in reprogramming and inhibiting cancer cells in clinical trials with patients with advanced liver cancer, as well as success in in vitro studies with 7 different human tumor lines. SCDSFs have also shown promise in the treatment of chronic diseases such as psoriasis and neurodegenerative diseases. This research will also allow the development of new treatments for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and multiple sclerosis. Unveiling the holistic future of medicine, the authors show how we will no longer need to approach the treatment of cancer and other degenerative diseases as a “fight,” but as a restoration of our cells’ original programming. With the advent of Information Medicine, we now have the power to program ourselves to heal.

An ethnography of post-Soviet Cubas health-care sector which reveals Cuba to be a pragmatic and contradictory state.

Chronicles the treatments and theories of American medicine in the 18th century.