Book ID: CBB579737369

Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital (2016)

unapi

Oshinsky, David M. (Author)


Doubleday

ISBN: Shelton

Publication Date: 2016
Physical Details: 418 pages
Language: English

From a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian comes a riveting history of New York's iconic public hospital that charts the turbulent rise of American medicine. Bellevue Hospital, on New York City's East Side, occupies a colorful and horrifying place in the public imagination: a den of mangled crime victims, vicious psychopaths, assorted derelicts, lunatics, and exotic-disease sufferers. In its two and a half centuries of service, there was hardly an epidemic or social catastrophe—or groundbreaking scientific advance—that did not touch Bellevue.     David Oshinsky, whose last book, Polio: An American Story, was awarded a Pulitzer Prize, chronicles the history of America's oldest hospital and in so doing also charts the rise of New York to the nation's preeminent city, the path of American medicine from butchery and quackery to a professional and scientific endeavor, and the growth of a civic institution. From its origins in 1738 as an almshouse and pesthouse, Bellevue today is a revered public hospital bringing first-class care to anyone in need. With its diverse, ailing, and unprotesting patient population, the hospital was a natural laboratory for the nation's first clinical research. It treated tens of thousands of Civil War soldiers, launched the first civilian ambulance corps and the first nursing school for women, pioneered medical photography and psychiatric treatment, and spurred New York City to establish the country's first official Board of Health.      As medical technology advanced, "voluntary" hospitals began to seek out patients willing to pay for their care. For charity cases, it was left to Bellevue to fill the void. The latter decades of the twentieth century brought rampant crime, drug addiction, and homelessness to the nation's struggling cities—problems that called a public hospital's very survival into question. It took the AIDS crisis to cement Bellevue's enduring place as New York's ultimate safety net, the iconic hospital of last resort. Lively, page-turning, fascinating, Bellevue is essential American history.

...More
Reviewed By

Review Shuko Tamao (2019) Review of "Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital". History of Psychiatry (pp. 125-126). unapi

Review Jessica Wang (2018) Review of "Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital". Bulletin of the History of Medicine (pp. 378-380). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB579737369/

Similar Citations

Book Aufses, Arthur H.; Niss, Barbara; (2002)
This House of Noble Deeds: The Mount Sinai Hospital, 1852-2002 (/isis/citation/CBB000302297/)

Book Francesco Bianchi; Giovanni Silvano; (2020)
Saggi di storia della salute. Medicina, ospedali e cura fra medioevo ed età contemporanea (/isis/citation/CBB840139278/)

Chapter Giovanni Silvano; (2020)
La macchina del soccorso nella Francia rivoluzionaria. Verso la laicizzazione della cura (/isis/citation/CBB233265226/)

Chapter Giovanni Silvano; (2020)
Una sfida per l’amministrazione di ospedali e ospizi a Parigi dopo l’89 (/isis/citation/CBB142493911/)

Book Jones, Greta; Malcolm, Elizabeth; (1999)
Medicine, disease, and the State in Ireland, 1650-1940 (/isis/citation/CBB000110599/)

Article García, Alfredo Martín; Álvarez, María José Pérez; (2007)
Hospitalidad y asistencia en la provincia de León a finales del Antiguo Régimen (1728--1896) (/isis/citation/CBB000820150/)

Book Toni Sirena; (2021)
La Falcadina ovvero la sifilide degli innocenti (/isis/citation/CBB908678831/)

Article Pencak, William; (2012)
Free Health Care for the Poor: The Philadelphia Dispensary (/isis/citation/CBB001200546/)

Chapter Vikram Patel; Dan J. Stein; (2015)
Common Mental Disorders in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Triad of Depression, Anxiety, and Somatization (/isis/citation/CBB639216606/)

Book Khalid, Amna; Johnson, Ryan; (2011)
Public Health in the British Empire: Intermediaries, Subordinates, and Public Health Practice, 1850--1960 (/isis/citation/CBB001033381/)

Chapter Giovanni Silvano; (2020)
Philip Pinel tra Francia e America nell’Ottocento (/isis/citation/CBB972746471/)

Article Lawrenson, Ross; (2004)
Medical Practice in New Zealand (1769--1860) (/isis/citation/CBB000932432/)

Article Paolo Petralia; Alberto Macciò; (2020)
Healthcare-related Itinerary in a Multicultural City in Northern Italy (/isis/citation/CBB240957940/)

Chapter Emmanuel Kwaku Akyeampong; (2015)
A Historical Overview of Psychiatry in Africa (/isis/citation/CBB694807581/)

Book Vouilloz Burnier, Marie-France; Barras, Vincent; (2004)
De l'hospice au réseau santé: Santé publique et systèmes hospitaliers valaisans, XIXe--XXe siècles (/isis/citation/CBB000720411/)

Book León Sanz, Pilar; (2010)
Health Institutions at the Origin of the Welfare Systems in Europe (/isis/citation/CBB001031598/)

Article Bruno Falconi; Daniela Bellettati; Carlo Cristini; Paolo Maria Galimberti; Lorenzo Lorusso; Alessandro Porro; Antonia Francesca Franchini; (2017)
Gli animali dell'Ospedale e della città: l'esempio della rabbia e dell'Istituto antirabbico dell'Ospedale Maggiore di Milano (/isis/citation/CBB305052307/)

Authors & Contributors
Silvano, Giovanni
Cristini, Carlo
Galimberti, Paolo Maria
Bellettati, Daniela
Francesco Bianchi
Sirena, Toni
Concepts
Hospitals and clinics
Public health
Medicine
Medicine and politics
Medicine and society
Psychiatric hospitals
Time Periods
19th century
18th century
20th century
Early modern
Renaissance
Medieval
Places
France
Italy
United States
Spain
Europe
New York (U.S.)
Institutions
Catholic University of Ireland (Dublin)
Royal Belfast Academical Institution
Mount Sinai School of Medicine
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment