From the Publisher
"Dr. Stanley Joel Reiser, a physician, historian and medical ethicist now at George Washington University, has been ruminating on these matters in scholarly circles for years. His latest collection of essays escapes the ivory tower and resonates precisely with today’s headlines. Anyone with more than a passing interest in our present health care logjam will be intrigued and enlightened by Dr. Reiser’s painstaking retracing of its origins." -Abigail Zuger, M.D.. The New York Times
“In a world of medicine so siloed, Stanley Reiser creates a linguistic bridge that allows both patient and practitioner to cross easily – from dialogue to technology, from care to cure. The result is a refreshing perspective on health as we know it today.” – John P. Howe III, MD, President and CEO, Project HOPE
“Wrap a physician, historian of science, philosopher/health policy expert, and accomplished writer and parable-maker (storyteller) all in one author at the same time, and you have Stanley Reiser. This important book uses the spotlight of history to illuminate the conundrums facing today’s healthcare industry.” – Roger Bulger, Past President of the Association of Academic Health Centers and Chairman of the Board of the Institute of Multicultural and Minority Medicine
“This is an important historical overview for the public to understand health care, as our technological medicine goes through reform, and for practitioners to appreciate the roots of our diagnostic tests and treatments. Technological Medicine is a must-read for those involved in changing our health care today.” – John D. Stoeckle, MD, Professor of Medicine, Emeritus, Harvard Medical School, and Honorary Physician, Massachusetts General Hospital
"Dr. Stanley Joel Reiser, a physician, historian and medical ethicist now at George Washington University, has been ruminating on these matters in scholarly circles for years. His latest collection of essays escapes the ivory tower and resonates precisely with today’s headlines. Anyone with more than a passing interest in our present health care logjam will be intrigued and enlightened by Dr. Reiser’s painstaking retracing of its origins." -Abigail Zuger, M.D.. The New York Times
“Studies of invention always reveal that machines reinvent us as surely as we invent them. Stanley Reiser offers a breathtakingly intimate portrait of how we’ve been molded by our stethoscopes, statistics, X-rays, iron-lungs . . . how they’ve recreated us. Forceps, sonograms, and bedside charts have each left us irreversibly altered.” – John H. Lienhard, author of The Engines of Our Ingenuity and How Invention Begins
"It is to Reiser's credit that, despite much emphasis on machines and instruments, he puts the patient above it all and constantly steers his discussions on technologies toward patient-doctor-health care provider relationships. Highly recommended."
—Choice
"In Technological Medicine, Stanley Joel Reiser explores the difficulties encountered by proposed technological advances as well as the practical and ethical conundrums these advances create once accepted. Reiser...discusses such technologies as the x-ray, the artifi cial kidney, the artificial respirator, and the electronic medical patient record." - Richard S. Mathis, Science
"For each technology considered, Reiser provides a rich historical and sociological context that suggests several key lessons that seem widely applicable regardless of the technology under consideration." -Eric G. Campbell, PhD, The Journal of the American Medical Association
"Technological Medicine condenses this long time-thinking...Well-written, amply documented..this book may be read as an ethical discussion of the use of technologies in medicine and as a contribution to the civic debate on US modern Medicine." - Christelle Rabier, Social History of Medicine
