BiblioVault - Books about Diseases

Wet Engine

Exploring the Mad Wild Miracle of the Heart

Brian Doyle

Oregon State University Press, 2012

In this poignant and startlingly original book, Brian Doyle examines the heart as a physical organ—how it is supposed to work, how surgeons try to fix it when it doesn’t—and as a metaphor: the seat of the soul, the power house of the body, the essence of spirituality. In a series of profoundly moving ruminations, Doyle considers the scientific, emotional, literary, philosophical, and spiritual understandings of the heart—from cardiology to courage, from love letters and pop songs to Jesus. Weaving these strands together is the torment of Doyle’s own infant son’s heart surgery and the inspiring story of the young heart doctor who saved Liam’s life.

The Wet Engine is a book that will change how you feel and think about the mysterious, fragile human heart. This new paperback edition includes a foreword by Dr. Marla Salmon, dean of the University of Washington School of Nursing.

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What does ‘Tropical Medicine’ stand for today?

Martin Grobusch

Amsterdam University Press, 2011

‘The Tropics’ in geographical and astronomical terms simply refers to the area between the tropics of Capricorn and Cancer; Tropical Medicine as a discipline, however, whose origins date back at least to the age of exploration, remains ill-defined and encompasses a wealth of different medical specialties and scientific areas, forming altogether the highly dynamic field of Medicine in the Tropics. The Tropencentrum within Infectious Diseases, Tropical Medicine and AIDS at the Amsterdam Medical Center contributes together with numerous partners and collaborators worldwide to the broad field of Tropical Medicine and Travel Medicine through a wealth of clinical care, teaching and research activities in Amsterdam, the Netherlands and abroad.

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When the Air Became Important

A Social History of the New England and Lancashire Textile Industries

Janet Greenlees

Rutgers University Press, 2019

In When the Air Became Important, medical historian Janet Greenlees examines the working environments of the heartlands of the British and American cotton textile industries from the nineteenth to the late twentieth centuries. Greenlees contends that the air quality within these pioneering workplaces was a key contributor to the health of the wider communities of which they were a part. Such enclosed environments, where large numbers of people labored in close quarters, were ideal settings for the rapid spread of diseases including tuberculosis, bronchitis and pneumonia. When workers left the factories for home, these diseases were transmitted throughout the local population, yet operatives also brought diseases into the factory. Other aerial hazards common to both the community and workplace included poor ventilation and noise. Emphasizing the importance of the peculiarities of place as well as employers’ balance of workers’ health against manufacturing needs, Greenlees’s pioneering book sheds light on the roots of contemporary environmentalism and occupational health reform. Her work highlights the complicated relationships among local business, local and national politics of health, and community priorities.

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Women and Health in America, 2nd Ed.

Historical Readings

Judith W. Leavitt

University of Wisconsin Press, 1999

In this thoroughly updated second edition, Judith Walzer Leavitt, a leading authority on the history of women's health issues, has collected thirty-five articles representing important scholarship in this once-neglected field. Timely and fascinating, this volume is organized chronologically and then by topic, covering studies of women and health in the colonial and revolutionary periods and the nineteenth century through the Civil War. The remainder of the book concentrates on the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries and addresses such controversial issues as body image and physical fitness, sexuality, fertility, abortion and birth control, childbirth and motherhood, mental illness, women's health care providers (midwives, nurses, physicians), and health reform and public health.

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The Women’s Concise Guide to a Healthier Heart

Karen J. Carlson, M.D.; Stephanie A. Eisenstat, M.D.; and Terra Ziporyn, Ph.D.

Harvard University Press, 1997

From the authors of The Harvard Guide to Women's Health

Heart disease is the number one killer of women in this country. Every year half a million American women die of heart problems--and another 2.5 million are hospitalized for heart disease. This book brings the risks and realities of cardiovascular disease for women into clear focus. Where previous books have concentrated on men, The Women's Concise Guide to a Healthier Heart recognizes and clarifies the significant differences between men and women in the diagnosis and treatment of cardiac conditions.

The book lays out in plain English all that we currently know about preventing, recognizing, and living with a heart problem. Does an aspirin a day prevent heart disease in women? Does moderate alcohol consumption help or hurt? What about weight gain in middle age? Estrogen replacement therapy? These are the kinds of everyday, life-and-death questions that are addressed specifically for women in this concise guide. It considers questions of cholesterol and diabetes, stress and depression, diet and smoking. It explores diagnostic procedures and surgeries and explains their differing reliability and benefits for women and men.

Helpfully illustrated and easy to use, clear and comprehensive on every heart problem and related symptom and behavior, this book is the best resource for any woman wishing to understand the health and workings of her heart.

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The Wonderful Art of the Eye

A Critical Edition of the Middle English Translation of his De Probatissimo Arte Oculorum

L. M. Eldredge

Michigan State University Press, 1996

A thirteenth-century treatise on the theory and practice of ophthalmology, this unique work provides a window on what passed for medical knowledge of the eye during the late Middle Ages. Although little is known of the author, Benevenutus Grassus, he seems to have roamed Italy in the early thirteenth century as a medical practitioner specializing in diseases of the eye.

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