Technological Medicine: The Changing World of Doctors and Patients

This book explores how the technologies of medicine are created; how society, patients, and practitioners respond to the problems and successes of their use; and how this response changes them. For, as we create technology and strive to apply its powers, it recreates us. To demonstrate the different ways through which medical innovations exert their influence, a number of selected technologies, such as the stethoscope, the X-ray, the artificial kidney, and the computerized health record, are examined. The understandings gained through this exploration are then applied to suggest fundamental ways to alter thinking and practice in health care and thereby more effectively meet the challenges of living with technological medicine. Dr. Stanley Joel Reiser's work will be indispensable to a wide readership of health professionals, health policymakers, and the general public.