A few weeks ago, Verity Burke from the blog Science book a day posted a list of 10 Great Books on the History of Medicine. Here is the list: Morbid Curiosities: Medical Museums in Nineteenth-Century Britain. Samuel J.M.M. Alberti (Oxford University Press, 2011) The Morbid Anatomy Anthology, ed. Joanna Ebenstein and Colin Dickey (Morbid Anatomy Press, 2014) The Sick Rose: Or, Disease and the Art of Medical Illustration. Richard Barnett (Thames and Hudson, 2014) Human Anatomy: Depicting the Body from the Renaissance to Today, eds. Benjamin A. Rifkin, Michael J. Akerman and Judith Folkenberg (Thames and Hudson, 2011) Women under the Knife. Ann Dally (Hutchinson Radiance, … [Read more...] about New: Archiving
New: Reflection
There's a phrase that I've come to use over and over again in recent years whenever I've presented at conferences or talked to people about the research I do, and I use it because it beautifully encapsulates what I think is perhaps the main problem now facing the physiotherapy profession. It comes from a book written by a New Zealand doctor who is part European and part Māori. His name is Glenn Colquhoun, and he's written some fantastic books about health care, using poetry and prose to express his ideas (see this link to his work). In one slim volume titled 'Jumping Ship,' Colquhoun describes his experience coming to terms with his Māori heritage. He spent a few years in the far … [Read more...] about New: Reflection
New: Histories
I’m speaking purely for myself here, but I feel that physiotherapy doesn’t really need any more quantitative research on hamstring stretching. I think we’ve seen enough evidence that pain is aversive, and that putting scores on complex conditions critically misrepresents the condition, the person’s lived experience, and the benefits of physiotherapy. Where I feel we could definitely do with more research - particularly these days, where we are increasingly looking for ideas about how physiotherapy might need to change in the future - is research about our past. Not just accounts of past events, although even some of this would be nice, but historical works that connect to messages … [Read more...] about New: Histories
New: Normals
Think about how much time you spent learning about the 'normal' body in physiotherapy school. Think about how much time you spend in clinical practice assessing people to see what's 'abnormal.' And all of those clinical trials that develop sensitive, reliable and valid measures of activity, bodily function, movement and pain; all based on some universal notion of normality. Tests and measures have to assume that there is one universal normal for them to be universal. So, in principal, a score of 13 on the Modified Borg Scale means the same thing in Afghanistan as it does in Alaska, and a BMI of 28 is obese no matter where you live. Physiotherapists learn the principal of … [Read more...] about New: Normals
New: humanities
Although it’s going to be hard to accept, particularly by those people currently striving to make a difference in the profession, but it probably won’t be this generation of physiotherapists that bring about the radical change necessary to prepare the profession for the new world of 21st century health care. There are any number of reasons for this: Physiotherapists are, by and large, a relatively conservative bunch, who don’t instigate radical change Physiotherapy is highly respected and well patronised, so there are few indicators that we need to change much Most people in positions of authority have received a traditional training, and tend to like things the way that they are, … [Read more...] about New: humanities
History of Physical Therapies in 19th Century New Zealand
Excuse the shameless plug, but I'm giving a public lecture on Thursday night (NZ time) on the History of Physical Therapies in 19th Century New Zealand, and it will be live streamed and recorded, so I thought some of you might be interested in seeing it. New Zealand offers an interesting case study because, in contrast to Europe and North America, where treatments like massage, mobilisation, hydrotherapy, electrotherapy and exercise were some of the most popular 'medical' remedies, physical therapies were almost invisible. New Zealand was a frontier colony for much of the 19th century, and a lot of settlers had little enough food to live on never mind indulging in such … [Read more...] about History of Physical Therapies in 19th Century New Zealand
The social construction of pain
äMedicine convinces us that we can understand the human condition biologically. Pain teaches us otherwise. Pain, as we know it today, bears all the hallmarks of a subjective phenomenon that can only be understood by the person experiencing it. Yet even this belief has a history; a history that is closely tied to the genealogy of the physiotherapy profession. Tony Ballantyne has explored the way pain became a vehicle for social reformers after the 17th century, shaping many of the health and social welfare reforms that were to follow. Ballantyne argues above that pain narratives were a powerful way for humanitarians to promote the belief that the state should take responsibility for … [Read more...] about The social construction of pain