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History China

Medical Transitions in Twentieth-Century China

edited by Bridie Andrews & Mary Brown Bullock

contributions by Yi-Li Wu, Nicole E. Barnes, Carol A. Benedict, Liping Bu, Chen Ling, Xiaoping Fang, Cheng Zhen, Rachel Core, Miriam Gross, Lincoln C. Chen, Xi Gao, Sonya Grypma, Veronica Pearson, Volker Scheid, Yu Xinzhong, Zhang Daqing, Ka-Wai Fan, Tina Phillips Johnson, Michelle Renshaw, John R. Watt & Sean H.-.L. Lei

Publisher
Indiana University Press
Initial publish date
Aug 2014
Category
China, Public Health, History
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9780253014900
    Publish Date
    Aug 2014
    List Price
    $33.00

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Description

This volume examines important aspects of China's century-long search to provide appropriate and effective health care for its people. Four subjects—disease and healing, encounters and accommodations, institutions and professions, and people's health—organize discussions across case studies of schistosomiasis, tuberculosis, mental health, and tobacco and health. Among the book's significant conclusions are the importance of barefoot doctors in disseminating western medicine, the improvements in medical health and services during the long Sino-Japanese war, and the important role of the Chinese consumer. Intended for an audience of health practitioners, historians, and others interested in the history of medicine and health in China, the book is one of three commissioned by the China Medical Board to mark its centennial in 2014.

About the authors

Bridie Andrews is an associate professor of history at Bentley University and teaches the history of medicine at New England School of Acupuncture. She has co-edited two books, Western Medicine as Contested Knowledge (with A.R. Cunningham, Manchester University Press, 1997) and Medicine and Identity in the Colonies (with Mary P. Sutphen, Routledge, 2003).

Bridie Andrews' profile page

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Chen Ling's profile page

Xiaoping Fang's profile page

Cheng Zhen's profile page

Rachel Core's profile page

Miriam Gross' profile page

Lincoln C. Chen's profile page

Xi Gao's profile page

Sonya Grypma is a leading scholar in the history of nursing and global health and an associate professor of nursing at Trinity Western University. She has gained an international reputation for her work on missionary nursing in China, particularly through her groundbreaking book Healing Henan: Canadian Nurses at the North China Mission, 1888–1947.

Sonya Grypma's profile page

Veronica Pearson's profile page

Volker Scheid's profile page

Yu Xinzhong's profile page

Zhang Daqing's profile page

Ka-Wai Fan's profile page

Tina Phillips Johnson's profile page

Michelle Renshaw's profile page

John R. Watt's profile page

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Editorial Reviews

[T]his volume provides an invaluable synthesis of modern medical development in China, and useful sources for survey courses on medical history, public health and the global circulation of knowledge.

Social History of Medicine

Overall, this work achieves what it set out to do: write a general overview of the great changes in the history of health and health care in twentieth-century China. The collection of papers is impressive and gives the reader a good introduction into the transformations in health and medical care in China.

Frontiers of History in Chinca

Anyone interested in the history of modern medicine will find this an especially instructive book for its focus on China, its treatment of political and social issues, and its explanation of how decollectivization and China's opening to a market economy have impacted medicine and health care. A substantial bibliography and detailed index make this a particularly useful volume for promoting further scholarship on the history and politics of medicine in contemporary China. . . . Highly recommended.

Choice

Medical Transitions in Twentieth Century China provides rich insights into how one country has dealt with perhaps the most central issue for any human society: the health and wellbeing of its citizens. Yet the book sheds light on more than simply China's own medical transitions, and should appeal to anyone interested more broadly in the modern history of health.

The Lancet