Blood and Guts: A History of Surgery
4.5/5
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About this ebook
Today, astonishing surgical breakthroughs are making limb transplants, face transplants, and a host of other previously un dreamed of operations possible. But getting here has not been a simple story of medical progress. In Blood and Guts, veteran science writer Richard Hollingham weaves a compelling narrative from the key moments in surgical history. We have a ringside seat in the operating theater of University College Hospital in London as world-renowned Victorian surgeon Robert Liston performs a remarkable amputation in thirty seconds—from first cut to final stitch. Innovations such as Joseph Lister's antiseptic technique, the first open-heart surgery, and Walter Freeman's lobotomy operations, among other breakthroughs, are brought to life in these pages in vivid detail. This is popular science writing at it's best.
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Reviews for Blood and Guts
13 ratings1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A superb very readable introduction into a complex subject. By no means exhaustative, but then it makes pains to ensure that this is understood, focusing instead on five branches of surgery: Cardiac, transplant, trauma, plastic & neurosurgery. It starts well, and uses vignettes to illustrate key points & problems facing the surgical pioneers in each field. In places, I think that non medics might find it gruesome but it is very readable & fascinatingly written. the author clearly has a talent for evoking a time & a place, and that adds to the feel of what is very well written first person history. The bibliography could have been longer, and it would have been nice to know where to find more about Harken, Gillies and the rest, but that is only a minor complaint. Well recommended to all, even the non medic, but especially those with an interest in the human condition