history, modern 1601-

Bellevue Hospital, on New York City's East Side, occupies a colorful and horrifying place in the public imagination: a den of mangled crime victims, vicious psychopaths, assorted derelicts, lunatics, and exotic-disease sufferers. In its two and a half centuries of service, there was hardly an epidemic or social catastrophe?or groundbreaking scientific advance?that did not touch Bellevue.

A unique encyclopedia that helps readers understand the myriad ways that the Columbian Exchange shaped the modern world, covering every major living organism from pathogens and plants to insects and mammals.

Traces the medical and social history of hysteria, at varoious times considered a biologically-based women's disorder or a problem of weak men in wartime, as well as some of the treatments that were devised for the condition, which is no longer recognized as a separate psychiatric disorder.

Traces the medical and social history of diabetes, examining changing ideas about the causes and treatments of the disease over the centuries.

Presents an examination of obsessive behavior and its evolution from a social and religious aspect of life into a psychiatric and medical problem, covering the clinical definition of the condition, the increase in obessive-compulsive disorder diagnoses since the late seventies, and many other topics within the field.

Traces the history and development of vaccines, the role of military and medical authority in the introduction of vaccines to the public, and the controversies over the use of some vaccines.

Traces the historical development of military medicine from the Middle Ages to modern times.

Presents an examination of obsessive behavior and its evolution from a social and religious aspect of life into a psychiatric and medical problem, covering the clinical definition of the condition, the increase in obsessive-compulsive disorder diagnoses since the late seventies, and many other topics within the field.