Medicine Transformed: Health, Disease and Society in Europe 1800-1930

During the nineteenth century medicine underwent a radical transformation. In 1800, the body was still understood in terms of humors and fluids, and a wide range of individuals provided medical care. Institutions were marginal to the medical enterprise, and governments took almost no part in providing medical services. By 1930 a recognisably modern medicine had begun to emerge across Europe. New understandings of the body opened up surgery and treatments, and hospitals became centres for care, research and training. In Medicine transformed, original essays by established scholars in the social history of medicine explore these developments and examine topics such as the military and colonial medicine, the role of women and access to care. The essays provide an accessible introduction to the subject, setting nineteenth and early twentieth-century medicine in its political, cultural, intellectual and economic contexts. Medicine transformed is complemented by a companion volume of primary and secondary readings: Health, disease and society in Europe, 1800-1930: A source book.