The Social Transformation of American Medicine: The Rise Of A Sovereign Profession And The Making Of A Vast Industry

Paul Starr

Basic Books, 1982 - History - 514 pages

Winner of the 1983 Pulitzer Prize and the Bancroft Prize in American History, this is a landmark history of how the entire American health care system of doctors, hospitals, health plans, and government programs has evolved over the last two centuries.

"The definitive social history of the medical profession in America....A monumental achievement."—H. Jack Geiger, M.D., New York Times Book Review

What people are saying

User Review -

"The dream of reason did not take power into account"—so begins this Pulitzer Prizewinning portrait of the development of the U.S. health-care system. Paul Starr, a sociology and public-affairs professor at Princeton University, tells the story in two parts. First, the rise of the medical profession through the 19th and early 20th centuries is shown to hinge on an unprecedented "cultural authority" derived from the legitimacy of science. It was this authority that enabled doctors to build a prosperous profession and to shape the medical system. In the second half of the book, Starr focuses on the ways in which for-profit corporations, such as insurance companies and hospitals, challenged the medical authority of doctors in the later decades of the 20th century, producing the health-care system—much criticized yet much envied—that the U.S. has today. - 8 Oct 2008 - The Wall Street Journal Europe - By Stephanie Snow - Just What the Doctor Ordered - 5 best books on Medicine 

Contents

• III: 3
• IV: 30
• V: 60
• VI: 79
• VIII: 145
• IX: 180
• X: 198
• XI: 235
• XII: 290
• XIII: 335
• XIV: 379
• XV: 420
• XVI: 450
• XVII: 496

About the author

Paul Starr is Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University and its Woodrow Wilson School of Public Affairs. He is the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Social Transformation of American Medicine and The Creation of the Media. Starr is the co-founder and editor of The American Prospect. He lives in Princeton, New Jersey.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Social Transformation of American Medicine: The Rise Of A Sovereign Profession And The Making Of A Vast Industry; Colophon books; The Social Transformation of American Medicine, Paul Starr
• Author: Paul Starr
• Publisher: Basic Books, 1982
• ISBN: 0465079350, 9780465079353
• Length: 514 pages
• Subjects: History / United States / General; Medical / Health Care Delivery; Medical / History