The Cambridge World History of Human Disease

Combining recent medical discoveries with historical and geographical scholarship, The Cambridge World History of Human Disease traces the concept of disease throughout history and in each major world... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0521332869
• ISBN13: 9780521332866
• Release Date: January 1993
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 1200 Pages
• Weight: 6.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 11.5" x 2.5" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Good overview of history of medicine

Great book, well thought out. The initial part of the book is chapters and essays on different topics. One critique I have is that the chapters and topics are very much individual entities and do not really flow from one chapter to another. It would be a bit difficult to trace the history of medicine in timeline fashion if you were to read this book. However, I don't think that is really the purpose of the book, and the essays themselves are quite interesting. The second part of the book is disease specific histories, which are pretty good, but a bit inconsistent in depth. Some diseases' histories are documented thoroughly and others are much more "general" in nature. Probably a reflection of the fact that they are written by different people. Nonetheless, a great resource and reference to have in any medical history library.

Outstanding Reference Source

This tome is exhaustive in the diseases it covers and the way it covers them. Kiple provides epidemiological patterns, history and geography, and skeletal manifestations on each of the conditions he and the board of editors describes. What the book lacks in pictures and diagrams, it makes up for in length and completeness of description. A helpful bibliography is provided. This book is well worth the price!