|
The Emperor Of All Maladies
''The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer'' is a book written by Siddhartha Mukherjee, an Indian-born American physician and oncologist. Published on 16 November 2010 by Scribner, it won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction: the jury called it "an elegant inquiry, at once clinical and personal". ''The Guardian'' wrote that "Mukherjee manages to convey not only a forensically precise picture of what he sees, but a shiver too, of what he feels." Title The book explains its title in its author's note: Content The book weaves together Mukherjee's experiences as a hematology/oncology fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital as well as the history of cancer treatment and research. Mukherjee gives the history of cancer from its first identification 4,600 years ago by the Egyptian physician Imhotep. The Greeks had no understanding of cells, but they were familiar with hydraulics. Hippocrates thus considered illness to be an imbalance of four cardinal flui ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Siddhartha Mukherjee
Siddhartha Mukherjee (born 21 July 1970) is an Indian-American physician, biologist, and author. He is best known for his 2010 book, '' The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer'', that won notable literary prizes including the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction, and Guardian First Book Award, among others. The book was listed in the "All-''Time'' 100 Nonfiction Books" (the 100 most influential books of the last century) by ''Time'' magazine in 2011. His 2016 book '' The Gene: An Intimate History'' made it to #1 on ''The New York Times'' Best Seller list, and was among ''The New York Times'' 100 best books of 2016, and a finalist for the Wellcome Trust Prize and the Royal Society Prize for Science Books. After completing secondary school education in India, Mukherjee studied biology at Stanford University, obtained a D.Phil. from University of Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, and an M.D. from Harvard University. He joined New York–Presbyterian Hospital / Columbi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cancer
Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal bleeding, prolonged cough, unexplained weight loss, and a change in bowel movements. While these symptoms may indicate cancer, they can also have other causes. Over 100 types of cancers affect humans. Tobacco use is the cause of about 22% of cancer deaths. Another 10% are due to obesity, poor diet, lack of physical activity or excessive drinking of alcohol. Other factors include certain infections, exposure to ionizing radiation, and environmental pollutants. In the developing world, 15% of cancers are due to infections such as ''Helicobacter pylori'', hepatitis B, hepatitis C, human papillomavirus infection, Epstein–Barr virus and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). These factors act, at least partly, by changing the genes of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rudolph Virchow
Rudolf Ludwig Carl Virchow (; or ; 13 October 18215 September 1902) was a German physician, anthropologist, pathologist, prehistorian, biologist, writer, editor, and politician. He is known as "the father of modern pathology" and as the founder of social medicine, and to his colleagues, the "Pope of medicine". Virchow studied medicine at the Friedrich Wilhelm University under Johannes Peter Müller. While working at the Charité hospital, his investigation of the 1847–1848 typhus epidemic in Upper Silesia laid the foundation for public health in Germany, and paved his political and social careers. From it, he coined a well known aphorism: "Medicine is a social science, and politics is nothing else but medicine on a large scale". His participation in the Revolution of 1848 led to his expulsion from Charité the next year. He then published a newspaper ''Die Medizinische Reform'' (''The Medical Reform''). He took the first Chair of Pathological Anatomy at the University of Wür ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
X-ray
An X-ray, or, much less commonly, X-radiation, is a penetrating form of high-energy electromagnetic radiation. Most X-rays have a wavelength ranging from 10 picometers to 10 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30 petahertz to 30 exahertz ( to ) and energies in the range 145 eV to 124 keV. X-ray wavelengths are shorter than those of UV rays and typically longer than those of gamma rays. In many languages, X-radiation is referred to as Röntgen radiation, after the German scientist Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen, who discovered it on November 8, 1895. He named it ''X-radiation'' to signify an unknown type of radiation.Novelline, Robert (1997). ''Squire's Fundamentals of Radiology''. Harvard University Press. 5th edition. . Spellings of ''X-ray(s)'' in English include the variants ''x-ray(s)'', ''xray(s)'', and ''X ray(s)''. The most familiar use of X-rays is checking for fractures (broken bones), but X-rays are also used in other ways. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Emil Grubbe
Émil Herman Grubbé (1 January 1875 — 26 March 1960) was possibly the first American to use x-rays as a treatment for cancer (versus detection) but this is disputed and no reliable contemporary source of this claim exists. He was born in Chicago, and received his medical training at a homeopathic institute: the Hahnemann Medical College of Chicago. It was there that Grubbe assembled the first x-ray machine in Chicago in 1896, and that same year, used it to treat a woman with recurrent carcinoma of the breast (disputed). He assembled the machine and began to use it in treatments less than a year after Wilhelm Röntgen announced his discovery of the x-ray. By 1960, Grubbe had instructed over 7000 other doctors in the medical use of x-rays. In the course of his lifetime, he underwent more than 90 operations for multiple cancers caused by his intense, ongoing exposure to radiation, a disease from which he died. Honors were bestowed upon Grubbe by numerous institutions, includ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Radical Mastectomy
Radical mastectomy is a surgical procedure involving the removal of breast, underlying chest muscle (including pectoralis major and pectoralis minor), and lymph nodes of the axilla as a treatment for breast cancer. Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women today, and is primarily treated by surgery, particularly during the early twentieth century when the mastectomy was developed with success. However, with the advancement of technology and surgical skills, the extent of mastectomies has been reduced. Less invasive mastectomies are employed today in comparison to those in the past. Nowadays, a combination of radiotherapy and breast conserving mastectomy are employed to optimize treatment. Radical mastectomy Halsted and Meyer were the first to achieve successful results with the radical mastectomy, thus ushering in the modern era of surgical treatment for breast cancer. In 1894, William Halsted published his work with radical mastectomy from the 50 cases operated ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Halsted
William Stewart Halsted, M.D. (September 23, 1852 – September 7, 1922) was an American surgeon who emphasized strict aseptic technique during surgical procedures, was an early champion of newly discovered anesthetics, and introduced several new operations, including the radical mastectomy for breast cancer. Along with William Osler (Professor of Medicine), Howard Atwood Kelly (Professor of Gynecology) and William H. Welch (Professor of Pathology), Halsted was one of the "Big Four" founding professors at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. His operating room at Johns Hopkins Hospital is in Ward G, and was described as a small room where medical discoveries and miracles took place. According to an intern who once worked in Halsted's operating room, Halsted had unique techniques, operated on the patients with great confidence and often had perfect results which astonished the interns. Throughout his professional life, he was addicted to cocaine and later also to morphine, which were no ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Surgeon
In modern medicine, a surgeon is a medical professional who performs surgery. Although there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon usually is also a licensed physician or received the same medical training as physicians before specializing in surgery. There are also surgeons in podiatry, dentistry, and veterinary medicine. It is estimated that surgeons perform over 300 million surgical procedures globally each year. History The first person to document a surgery was the 6th century BC Indian physician-surgeon, Sushruta. He specialized in cosmetic plastic surgery and even documented an open rhinoplasty procedure.Ira D. Papel, John Frodel, ''Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery'' His magnum opus ''Suśruta-saṃhitā'' is one of the most important surviving ancient treatises on medicine and is considered a foundational text of both Ayurveda and surgery. The treatise addresses all aspects of general medicine, but the translator G. D. Si ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Matthew Baillie
Matthew Baillie FRS (27 October 1761 – 23 September 1823) was a British physician and pathologist, credited with first identifying transposition of the great vessels (TGV) and situs inversus. Early life and education He was born in the manse at Shotts in Lanarkshire, the son of Rev Prof James Baillie DD (1723-1778) and his wife, Dorothea Hunter (sister of Dr John Hunter and Dr William Hunter. His father was Professor of Divinity at Glasgow University. His sisters were centenarian Agnes Baillie (1760-1761) and poet/author Joanna Baillie. He was a pupil of his uncle, the anatomist John Hunter and his father-in-law, Dr. Thomas Denman, a pre-eminent obstetrician in London at the turn of the nineteenth century, whose textbook on childbirth had been first published in 1788. Baillie was educated at the Old Grammar School of Hamilton (renamed the Hamilton Academy in 1848), the University of Glasgow, and obtained his MD from the University of Oxford in 1789, having been named Snell ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andreas Vesalius
Andreas Vesalius (Latinized from Andries van Wezel) () was a 16th-century anatomist, physician, and author of one of the most influential books on human anatomy, ''De Humani Corporis Fabrica Libri Septem'' (''On the fabric of the human body'' ''in seven books''). Vesalius is often referred to as the founder of modern human anatomy. He was born in Brussels, which was then part of the Habsburg Netherlands. He was a professor at the University of Padua (1537–1542) and later became Imperial physician at the court of Emperor Charles V. ''Andreas Vesalius'' is the Latinized form of the Dutch name Andries van Wesel. It was a common practice among European scholars in his time to Latinize their names. His name is also given as ''Andrea Vesalius'', ''André Vésale'', ''Andrea Vesalio'', ''Andreas Vesal'', ''Andrés Vesalio'' and ''Andre Vesale''. Early life and education Vesalius was born as Andries van Wesel to his father Anders van Wesel and mother Isabel Crabbe on 31 December 151 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Democedes
Democedes of Croton (; el, Δημοκήδης), described in ''The Histories of Herodotus'' as "the most skillful physician of his time". Democedes's background Democedes was a Greek physician and a member of the court of Darius I. He was born in Croton, in southern Italy. His father was Calliphon, a priest and physician at Croton at the time of Pythagoras. His first position as physician seems to be in civil service of Athens and Aegina. Later he entered service under Polycrates. In 522 B.C., Polycrates, his entourage, and Democedes were all captured as Lydians by Oroetes and sent to Susa. Democedes's travels Herodotus describes the journeys of Democedes with much detail. Services rendered to Darius and Atossa Darius once sprained his ankle while he was hunting, and his Egyptian doctors could not help his ankle. However, Democedes was able to heal his ankle, and he was thereafter given great esteem. The court regarded his actions highly enough that he was able to eat in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cyrus The Great
Cyrus II of Persia (; peo, 𐎤𐎢𐎽𐎢𐏁 ), commonly known as Cyrus the Great, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire, the first Persian empire. Schmitt Achaemenid dynasty (i. The clan and dynasty) Under his rule, the empire embraced all of the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Western Asia and much of Central Asia. Spanning from the Mediterranean Sea and Hellespont in the west to the Indus River in the east, the empire created by Cyrus was the largest the world had yet seen. At its maximum extent under his successors, the Achaemenid Empire stretched from parts of the Balkans ( Eastern Bulgaria– Paeonia and Thrace– Macedonia) and Southeast Europe proper in the west to the Indus Valley in the east. The reign of Cyrus lasted about thirty years; his empire took root with his conquest of the Median Empire followed by the Lydian Empire and eventually the Neo-Babylonian Empire. He also led an expedit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
