Today's image was suggested by Filip Maric. Click on the image to open it to full size. You can then save it and turn it into a desktop background by following these brief instructions. … [Read more...] about 30 Days of September: Day 8
Half the pain, half the gain
The subject of pain features quite a lot in these blogposts (see here, or here, for example). Not because the members of the CPN are particularly expert in matters pertaining to pain, or because its of any more clinical interest than, say, cerebral palsy. Pain is interesting, I think, partly because it's become such a popular subject in the profession, and members of the CPN are prone to asking questions like 'why this, why now?' In recent weeks a few social media feeds have explored, once again, how we might better understand pain, and improve on our assessment and treatment techniques. I've been struck by how almost all of these conversations are prefaced on the idea that pain is … [Read more...] about Half the pain, half the gain
On pleasure
Something for the weekend, in honour of my dear friend BG, who could do with a laugh right now... Lying in bed would be an altogether perfect and supreme experience if only one had a coloured pencil long enough to draw on the ceiling (G. K. Chesterton). How beautiful it is to do nothing and then rest afterwards (Spanish proverb). No pleasure is worth giving up for the sake of two more years in a geriatric home in Weston-super-Mare (Kingsley Amis). … [Read more...] about On pleasure
New book – Feeling pleasures: The sense of touch in Renaissance England
There has been a lot more interest in the philosophy of touch in recent years. Books like Constance Classen's Book of Touch have raised the bar on scholarship in this area (also see Classen's 'Centre for Sensory Studies' at Concordia Uni). A lot of interest has focused on the meaning of touch; something I've been interested in as a historian and philosopher of physiotherapy (link). Now a new book has been published by OUP that looks really interesting and well worth a read if you are interested in attitudes towards touch over time. Feeling Pleasures: Sense of Touch in Renaissance England Joe Moshenska The sense of touch had a deeply uncertain status in the sixteenth and … [Read more...] about New book – Feeling pleasures: The sense of touch in Renaissance England
Strong and modern – physiotherapy and physical culture
Physiotherapists are very interested in fitness, leisure and sport, but they rarely discuss the history of these ideas, or the place of physical therapies (massage, manipulations and mobilisations, remedial exercise, electrotherapy, hydrotherapy etc.) in the promotion of the health of the population. There are a number of reasons why I think we should pay more attention to this specific history. Firstly, it's one of the few areas where physical therapies have made a genuine contribution to the health of the population. I don't mean the health of individual patients that, taken together, amounts to the health of the population, but rather an approach applied to the population as a whole - … [Read more...] about Strong and modern – physiotherapy and physical culture