Originally published 1979 The Scientific Revolution in Victorian Medicine looks at the discovery of inhalation anaesthesia in 1846, and how it began a new era in surgery. The book looks at James Young Simpson’s demonstration of the value of chloroform as an anaesthetic, and how many surgeons quickly adopted it. The book also looks at the dangers of chloroform if mishandled and only after considerable controversy and numerous fatalities was its use thoroughly understood and established. Ten years later an even more lengthy struggle began over antiseptic surgery. The ‘germ’ theory, on which Lister’s technique was founded had few adherents among British surgeons, and his methods were deemed absurdly complicated. He was opposed and sometimes ridiculed by the most distinguished men in the profession, including Simpson. Over ten years were required to persuade the majority of British surgeons that Lister did actually achieve the results which he claimed and that it was possible for a competent surgeon to do equally well, if only he would take the trouble. This book shows that a great many factors interacted in delaying the introduction of these new ideas. The almost wholly unscientific nature of British medical education and practice before 1860 or 1870, detailed in the first chapter, was one factor; rivalry and distrust between London and Scotland was another. Genuine disadvantages in the new methods were not unimportant either, while personal animosities failure to face the facts, and fear of the unknowable consequences of change all played a significant part.

Editor Joseph P. Byrne, together with an advisory board of specialists and over 100 scholars, research scientists, and medical practitioners from 13 countries, has produced a uniquely interdisciplinary treatment of the ways in which diseases pestilence, and plagues have affected human life. From the Athenian flu pandemic to the Black Death to AIDS, this extensive two-volume set offers a sociocultural, historical, and medical look at infectious diseases and their place in human history from Neolithic times to the present. Nearly 300 entries cover individual diseases (such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, Ebola, and SARS); major epidemics (such as the Black Death, 16th-century syphilis, cholera in the nineteenth century, and the Spanish Flu of 1918-19); environmental factors (such as ecology, travel, poverty, wealth, slavery, and war); and historical and cultural effects of disease (such as the relationship of Romanticism to Tuberculosis, the closing of London theaters during plague epidemics, and the effect of venereal disease on social reform). Primary source sidebars, over 70 illustrations, a glossary, and an extensive print and nonprint bibliography round out the work.

This book is designed to offer practitioners clear, up-to-date guidance on the management of complications associated with maxillofacial cosmetic surgery. The first section provides a detailed overview of general topics relating to cosmetic surgery patients, including assessment, anesthesia and medical complications, wound healing, postoperative infection, pain management, and medicolegal issues. The second section then discusses the nature and management of the complications associated with each maxillofacial cosmetic surgery procedure, from laser treatment and use of neuromodulators and soft tissue fillers to orthognathic surgery, rhinoplasty, neck procedures, rhytidectomy, genioplasty, and facial implants. Complications in Maxillofacial Cosmetic Surgery is multi-authored, multi-institutional, and multi-specialty based. It will be of value for a range of health care providers who practice in the head and neck area, including oral and maxillofacial surgeons, otolaryngologists, plastic and reconstructive surgeons, dermatologists, and cosmetic surgeons.

A magisterial history of the artists and writers who left Weimar when the Nazis came to power In 1933 thousands of intellectuals, artists, writers, militants and other opponents of the Nazi regime fled Germany. They were, in the words of Heinrich Mann, “the best of Germany,” refusing to remain citizens in this new state that legalized terror and brutality. Exiled across the world, they continued the fight against Nazism in prose, poetry, painting, architecture, film and theater. Weimar in Exile follows these lives, from the rise of national socialism to their return to a ruined homeland, retracing their stories, struggles, setbacks and rare victories. The dignity in exile of Walter Benjamin, Ernst Bloch, Bertolt Brecht, Alfred Döblin, Hanns Eisler, Heinrich Mann, Thomas Mann, Anna Seghers, Ernst Toller, Stefan Zweig and many others provides a counterpoint to the story of Germany under the Nazis.

Endocrine surgery - the subspecialty of general surgery involving diseases of the thyroid, parathyroid, and adrenal glands as well as the endocrine pancreas - is a rapidly growing field of medicine that has a rich and fascinating history. As recently as the mid-19th Century, surgery for thyroid goiter was described as "horrid butchery" and believed by many to be too dangerous for any surgeon to attempt. Through the ingenuity and tireless efforts of surgeons in Europe and the U.S., thyroidectomy became a safe and even elegant operation, one that renowned Johns Hopkins surgeon William Halsted would describe in 1926 as representing "the supreme triumph of the surgeon's art." In this unique and captivating book, these and other seminal stories from the history of endocrine surgery are vividly retold by the current leaders in the field.