In the 18th century, there was no standardized training for practitioners of medicine (or “physic(k),” as it was referred to at the time). The level of care sick individuals received was proportional to their social status, and diagnosis and treatment of illnesses varied widely between doctors. Medicine at Yale: The First 200 Years is the story of the evolution of medical training and practice from the time when the Yale Medical Institution first received its charter in 1810 until the present. The narrative is laid out as a continuing timeline, broken down into four 50-year segments. Each segment begins with an essay describing the medical culture at Yale and continues with scattered paragraphs and essays about influential occurrences and discoveries made at Yale during the relevant period.
When Yale opened the doors of the sixth medical school in the United States in 1813, its students were required to behave in accordance with the laws of the school, which meant that they were “not permitted to assault . . . the President . . . nor were they permitted to wear women’s apparel, or pick locks, or commit like crimes.” The fledgling medical school managed to survive harsh critiques, monetary troubles, and charges of grave robbing and became a highly respected medical institution that receives more funding from the National Institutes of Health per faculty member than any other school in the country. Yale University has been the home of such accomplished individuals as Harvey Cushing (first successful brain surgeon), Seymour R. Lipsky (inventor of High Performance Liquid Chromatography), Paul Greengard (Nobel Laureate for his work on neurotransmitters), George E. Palade (discovered the ribosome), Joan Steitz (discovered snRNPs) and Thomas Steitz (Nobel Laureate for his work on ribosome structure). Yale has seen myriad medical advances, ranging from the development of tissue culture techniques to the creation of the first artificial heart, and the discovery of therapies such as the “morning-after” pill and the HIV therapy D4T.
In recent years, Yale University has continued to expand its medical and research facilities with the addition of the West Campus in 2007 and the Smilow Cancer Center, which opened in 2009. And just as the book concludes with a series of essays about the future of medical practice, so, too, is the reader left feeling that there is much more to come. Medicine at Yale: The First 200 Years offers glimpses into the history of both Yale Medical School and the medical community in general while endorsing the notion that we will continue to see comparable medical advancements in the next 200 years. Yet although the book’s primary focus is the development of medicine, it also provides fascinating insight into the cultural modalities of the past two centuries. It is this integration of history, science, and culture that makes this book a fun read for audience members from all walks of life.
Medicine at Yale: The First 200 Years