Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital By David M. Oshinsky
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This is where they are taken Recently Bellevue has gone through some transitions Research is not as prevalent due to losses sustained from Hurricane Sandy The architecture has been updated and expanded but what has not changed is its lack of funding The mayor does what he can working money into the budget There is also a relationship with NYU Alas Obamacare has done nothing to assist in the travails of a poor unwell patient Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital This long and occasionally dry microhistory profiles Manhattan s Bellevue Hospital from its origins in the late 18th Century as an almshouse in a semi rural location overlooking the East River.
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David Oshinsky chronicles the history of America s oldest hospital and in so doing also charts the rise of New York to the nation s preeminent city the path of American medicine from butchery and quackery to a professional and scientific endeavor and the growth of a civic institution From its origins in 1738 as an almshouse and pesthouse Bellevue today is a revered public hospital bringing first class care to anyone in need With its diverse ailing and unprotesting patient population the hospital was a natural laboratory for the nation s first clinical research It treated tens of thousands of Civil War soldiers launched the first civilian ambulance corps and the first nursing school for women pioneered medical photography and psychiatric treatment and spurred New York City to establish the country s first official Board of Health As medical technology advanced voluntary hospitals began to seek out patients willing to pay for their care For charity cases it was left to Bellevue to fill the void The latter decades of the twentieth century brought rampant crime drug addiction and homelessness to the nation s struggling cities problems that called a public hospital s very survival into question It took the AIDS crisis to cement Bellevue s enduring place as New York s ultimate safety net the iconic hospital of last resort Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied HospitalThe venerable Bellevue Hospital in New York City is considered to be the flagship of public hospitals The staff there will treat and provide exceptional care to anyone regardless of their ability to pay. Bellevue club hotel Bellevue can trace its roots to the 1660 s when the Dutch West India Company established an infirmary to serve its soldiers When the British took control of Manhattan Island they built a permanent almshouse there in 1736 However as the needs of the citizens grew a larger building was constructed further north along the East River. Bellevue club hotel Author David Oshinsky s meticulously researched and well written book traces the history of Bellevue as it grew along with the city of New York from its early days to the present It is a fascinating account of the growth not only of Bellevue and New York City but also about the growth practice and advancement of medicine itself Anyone interested in medicine would learn much from reading this enlightening book Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital A well written and sometimes interesting history on Bellevue Hospital in NY If I assessed the twenty chapters individually or read as a serial spanning twenty weeks Bellevue would definitely be four star material However there is little flow to the book overall and the chapters do not relate to one another so I couldn t take any big themes away My second gripe with the book is that there was little description of the hospital overall so it is hard to really place the building in my mind or anchor much to it My last gripe is that the chapter focal points were sometimes on people sometimes on the illnesses sometimes on ethnic groups sometimes on business and so on Here is a brief review of the chapters in chronological order. Bellevue garage 1 Beginnings going back to the 1660 s and up through the late 1700s all kinds of diseases that killed people A lot of research for this chapter covering 100 years 5 stars 2 Hosack s vision Covered Hosack s vision to treat the poor and disadvantaged 4 stars 3 The Great Epidemic Covered the Typhus outbreak of 1847 Interesting but at only nineteen pages it was too short 3 stars 4 Teaching medicine Bellevue incorporates a medical college in 1850s Turning point for the advancement of medicine 3 stars. Bellevue hotel 5 A Hospital in War Covers the civil war Very interesting too short 4 stars 6 Hives of Sickness and Vice On sanitation and connecting the dots to the source of cholera typhoid 5 stars. Bellevue toulouse 8 Bellevue Venus Confusing chapter famous picture of the woman with elephantitis 2 stars 9 Nightingales Advancement of nurses 4 stars 10 Germ Theory A takeaway message of the book but too short at ten pages 4 stars 11 Tale of Two Presidents Bellevue treated two presidents one of whom died James Garfield and the other Grover Cleveland probably the best one 5 stars. Bellevue ffo 5 stars for Bellevue FWIW If you are looking for a great non fiction book written about a hospital then the best that I have read hands down is Five Days at Memorial by reporter Sheri Fink This 2014 book covered the five days of devastation that Hurricane Katrina threw at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans primarily flooding that led the doctors to make some very difficult and with hindsight terrible decisions Warning there are some terrifying scenes the euthanasia scenes described in the book still give me nightmares The book won many awards Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital I found this book Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital absolutely fascinating Oshinsky not only tells the sweeping detailed history of Bellevue but also the history of American medicine nursing public health environmental health medical research education and public hospitals. Ebook bellevue pdf The author states it was one of the first hospitals starting in the 1660s It is famous not only as a mental hospital but as one of the finest emergency and trauma centers in the country It has a long history as the leading infectious disease facility treating yellow fever tuberculosis AIDS to Ebola Steven Forster died at Bellevue and Francis Ford Coppola filmed scenes of the Godfather in its morgue. Bellevue garage Oshinsky tells about the hospital s role during the Civil War caring for the most Union soldiers of any hospital The author tells of advances in medicine nursing and ambulance service during the Civil War Bellevue was the first hospital to have ambulance services starting after the Civil War They also designed the first horse drawn ambulance used in the City Through affiliations with medical schools it became the largest teaching hospital in the country and a leading research facility Bellevue is the leading research facility on AIDS Bellevue treats than 600000 patients annually. Bellevue garage The book is well written and meticulously researched Oshinsky writes in a clear concise way that is easily readable Oshinsky is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist This is the first book I have read by Oshinsky I am looking forward to reading of his books Oshinsky builds a strong case for the need of public hospitals I highly recommend this book Fred Sanders does an excellent job narrating the book Sanders is a stage actor and audiobook narrator Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital 2018 Reading Challenge microhistoryBellevue has always been synonymous with mental health similar to Bedlam in London but its history is actually much complex From treating the tens of thousands of victims of the Spanish flu to the less than a handful of cases of Ebola Bellevue is a top medical and research facility of America More than a hundred languages are spoken in the halls of the campus the most common including Spanish as well as Haitian Creole Bellevue saw the first outbreaks of AIDS it had a wing solely for tuberculosis it is where NYC s homeless are sent But being a public center of city healthcare brings crime including drug use rape and murder Mark David Chapman was diagnosed while Lennon s body lay wrapped in a sheet. Kindle avis a few buildings away in the compound This is just one instance when the staff was placed in a precarious position when personal feeling had to be put aside for professional oath There have been various famous patients to grace the beds of Bellevue the most obscure story belonging to folk songwriter Stephen Foster There are also several history writing physicians And Bellevue also opened the first male nurse training school It was a trailblazer from the day it opened All of this has been realized on a budget next to nil As mentioned Bellevue is a public hospital they take all charity cases ANY cases the private hospital doctors wished not to treat for whatever reason and in turn were referred to Bellevue must be accepted When the police round up displaced persons who need care to today s battled and beleaguered complex that Mayor Bill di Blasio has assured us has a place in Manhattan s future as well as its past Bellevue s tale unfolds best as a series of tragedies and challenges one after the other including smallpox plague typhoid cholera influenza tuberculosis and AIDS It even had a hand in treating Ebola and the hospital staff s response to Superstorm Sandy 2012 when the generators were flooded out is nothing short of heroic I for one though would like to have seen of a sense of historical continuity over the years For example World War II rates just a few brief mentions when surely the amount and origin of inpatients during the war years must have changed significantly Read this book if you like I know of no substitute but expect slow going at times Author David Oshinsky also wrote the award winning Polio An American Story Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital Bellevue is featured in many historical mysteries as well as many fictional books on madness and insanity so I was very curious to read the real story behind this storied hospital I also loved the way this book was laid out in a linear fashion after a preface that explores what will be found within the famous people who have been patients and some who died there We learn about the changing faces of this hospital a hospital that in one form or another has been active since the 18th century The epidemics treated here the doctors but also the changing faces of medicine as a whole We are also treated to a history of New York the changing neighborhoods the immigrants and how all played out in this amazing hospital Bellevue was the first to have an ambulance the first nursing school and so much How it was affected by Hurricane Sandy and the Ebola scare not too long past One thing that has never changed is its standard to treat those who cannot afford to pay and not to release a patient that has no one to care for them on the outside So my outlook on this hospital has changed from a formidable fear to one of deep admiration Love how books can do that Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital Many Americans even those who have never lived in New York City have heard of Bellevue Hospital certainly of some patients and probably some of its doctors Its storied history captures our imagination it has fearlessly and insistently treated epidemics for centuries as well as the widest range of disease in our nation s largest city For most of its history Bellevue was a teaching hospital associated with two IV League medical schools Columbia and Cornell along with that of New York University In 1966 Columbia and Cornell turned over their commitment to NYU who produced distinguished physicians trained on some of the world s most difficult and unusual cases. Bellevue bookstore memphis Land situated on the banks of the East River about 3 miles from downtown Manhattan called Bel Vue was leased in 1795 to serve as a hospital for those afflicted with yellow fever It could be reached by boat on horseback or by carriage The location meant one could enjoy cooling breezes and yet be far enough away from the city to avoid spreading infection Ever since that time Bellevue has served as a public hospital open to handle the contagious cases for which there is no cure I don t think there is a disease in Osler s Textbook of Medicine that I didn t see said Bellevue medical intern Dr Connie Guion in 1916 Bellevue was the center of the AIDS epidemic in New York beginning in the 1980 and in 1990 Bellevue s Infectious Disease Specialist Dr Fred Valentine was instrumental in finding a cocktail of drugs that would keep the infection from progressing Most recently in 2014 Dr Craig Spencer a volunteer with Doctors without Borders arrived in Bellevue to be treated for Ebola New York s only Ebola patient Aggressive treatment and early diagnosis helped to assure his survival and he was released three weeks later. Bellevue bookstore memphis The story of Bellevue is in many ways the story of medicine in the United States plagued by lack of understanding of the role of sanitation in perpetuating disease and discovering how lack of family or opportunities might lead to poverty madness and despair Almost from the start Bellevue had patients unable to pay for their care or explain their malady and yet they could not be turned away It has always been a refuge for those who had no where else to go the homeless the indigent the immigrant Today Whites rank last in patient race Bellevue not only handles disease but has always handled catastrophic injuries from the city and environs Oshinsky describes the aftermath of the 1863 Conscription Act riots riots which began because the poor were drafted to serve in the Union army the city erupted in mob violence poor on rich white on black native on immigrant Catholic on Protestant More than one hundred died and injuries were grievous This is war zone medicine a Bellevue emergency room doctor observed in 1990 You ll never go anywhere in the world and see something we haven t seen here. Bellevue club hotel Oshinsky is careful not to whitewash Bellevue s history His descriptions can be shocking in what they tell us of conditions there throughout the years Never particularly well funded this public hospital was at the mercy of state budgets and political jockeying and yet it attracted outsized medical talent by dint of its size location and affiliation The worst bits doctors operating before antibiotics or anesthetics or psychotic homeless camping in unused closets cannot keep the reader from finishing this read in absolute awe of the place Bellevue has been rebuilt several times the latest ribbon cutting in 1973 after two decades of construction to the tune of 200 million Twenty five floors for patients each an acre or in size with stunning views of the river or the Manhattan skyline Twenty elevators service the space An I. Bellevue pd ne Bellevue has had famous patients including expos writing journalist Nellie Bly and famous doctors Dr Andre Frederic Cournand and Dr Dickinson Richards won the 1956 Nobel Prize for their work on cardiac catheterization The ambidextrous surgeon Dr Valentine Mott performed of the great operations at Bellevue than any man living in the words of Sir Ashley Cooper England s leading surgeon at the end of the eighteenth century Any day at Bellevue is positively epic in scope novelistic operatic even When Oshinsky talks about NYC s Office of Medical Examiner being headquartered at Bellevue in the early part of the twentieth century and managed by Bellevue s chief pathologist the powerful combination of politics criminality medicine and forensics feels explosive This is Life writ large in all its manifestations and Death likewise It is a gigantic voracious story. Bellevue callian For those interested in the history of medicine this is a must read The heroic pieces of the story are difficult to resist David Oshinsky won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for History for Polio An American Story and knows how to tell a big story There can t be that many who could do what he has done with this magnificent effort Published in 2016 by Doubleday Photographs on my blog and in the finished copy of this book Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital One does not have to live in NYC to know the name Bellevue the famous or infamous public hospital which began as an almshouse in 1796 and over the years slowly morphed into a collection of buildings serving and housing the indigent and criminally insane Much of the bad reputation that unfortunately still sometimes clings to Bellevue was resultant from those early days when the conditions were similar to the horrors of Bedlam London s most notorious asylum But the Bellevue of today is the safety net of health care in NYC open to all regardless of ability to pay and serving as a teaching hospital for several prestigious medical schools Pulitzer Prize winning author David Oshinsky takes the reader on a fascinating trip through the history of this medical institution and of the dedicated men and women who fought against public apathy and lack of funds to improve health care for the poor and forgotten Bellvue created the first ambulance service nursing school for women based on the model created by Florence Nightingale outpatient clinics and departments of psychiatry and pediatrics But the buildings were falling into horrible disrepair and the lack of patient revenue was creating a huge financial deficit There was talk of closing Bellevue but President Lyndon Johnson s creation of Medicare and Medicaid saved the day providing medical insurance coverage to those who previously were treated free of charge and Bellevue prevailed. History bellevue washington This is the biography of a hospital which rose from a cesspit to one of America s most esteemed public medical facilities It is enlightening and inspiring and highly recommended Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital This book was 100% written by a historian not a biographist so temper expectations accordingly Bellevue is a famous some might say infamous hospital in New York City and when I saw my friend Melora s review I was intrigued by the combination of NYC medicine and general nuttiness However Oshinsky believes one should start at the very beginning to wit from the very origins of ownership on the piece of land Bellevue occupies to its modern role in the city Along the way he digresses into the development of medical practice immigration the Civil War politics in NYC public health the politics of poverty and health electroshock therapy AIDS and Sandy The topics are often interesting but result in an uneven whole. Bellevue pd ne Bellevue the name of a river estate was leased in 1795 by to become a hospital for people suffering from yellow fever since it was so far from the city As Oshinsky continues he traces the origins of disease management in the burgeoning seaport of NYC and Bellevue s role in both caring for poor immigrants and unusual diseases. Bellevue wa homes for sale He recounts how the practice of medicine grew developing from its infancy along the lines of surgeons the bone setter doctors and apothecaries Doctors were usually wealthy people who may have gone to school or may have only apprenticed and Bellevue s never ending supply of patients meant a never ending opportunities for students to learn on people who couldn t afford to go elsewhere Oshinsky is especially fascinated by the practice of blood letting and tells us far too much about it However it was apparently part of the cause of death of one of our Presidents A section on the Civil War brought advances in medicine eventually and about the same time anesthesia was developed that allowed people to better tolerate surgery Progress was made on successful amputations that doctors during the war brought back to Bellevue Bellevue doctors were also connected with treating Presidents Lincoln and Garfield. Bellevue toulouse Meanwhile as NYC grew so did the need for medical facilities which often seemed to pan out among class lines with New York Hospital taking fee paying patients As NYC struggled with immigrant issues and prejudice hospitals started to specialize with Jews Hospital opening in 1855 now the famous Mount Sinai and the German Hospital in 1868 anti German sentiment in WWI led to it being renamed Lenox Hill in 1918 There were also hospitals focusing on Presbyterians Episcopalians German Catholics St Francis and poor Italians Columbus Ed now that America is less religious we just have hospitals for the Catholics And a lot of hospitals unofficially stratified by economic status Public health departments took off because of a Bellevue doctor who realized many of his typhus patients lived in a particular East Side tenement Collaborating with a journalist they shamed a landlord into repairs He testified before Congress and helped write the Metropolitan Health Act revolutionizing public health and improving a child mortality of 25% Ed another good thing government does people is look after your health and safety Another doctor who had helped start an ambulance corps during the Civil War ended up at Bellevue where he became instrumental in getting ambulance stagecoaches stocked with whiskey bandages and a straightjacket all the essentials of a modern E. Bellevue washington time R I m joking A section on Hurricane Sandy in 2012 was intriguing Despite the lessons from Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Irene the year earlier staff at Bellevue decided to shelter in place and stay open Though generators were on the thirteenth floor the fuel pumps for Bellevue located along the river remember were in the basement As the local Con Edison blew the generators ran dry and a gasoline bucket brigade was formed When the extent of Sandy s damage became clear Bellevue finally closed resulting in a patient diaspora. Bellevue biography meaning I also found the section on AIDS fascinating NYC was pretty close to ground zero with the epidemic and Bellevue with its tradition of providing health care to the uninsured indigent people of the city was one of the first places to notice the unusual clusters of Kaposi s sarcoma and pneumocistis carcinii since renamed jiroveci that characterized late stages of the syndrome It dovetailed briefly with a discussion on hospice end of life care and nursing which was both interesting and sad. Bellevue book summary Overall sections were extremely interesting but there was a lot of digressive and filler material that detracted from the focus on Bellevue specifically For instance the section on Hurricane Sandy was contrasted with another nearby semi private hospital Tisch Hospital as well as hospitals in New Orleans Independently of a book about Bellevue that would have been an interesting book in and of itself I certainly found descriptions of dealing with hospitalized patients during disaster fascinating The section on AIDs is likewise contrasted with response to the crisis in San Francisco interesting definitely and again worth of a book but less important to Bellevue itself It felt like many historical books focused to the mass market digressing into semi titillating side stories that aren t as germane. Bellevue pd ne Overall lots of fascinating topics covered contextualized by one of America s first hospitals to serve the poor There s a nice set of colorplates in the edition I read which is interesting and particularly helpful in discussion of a somewhat controversial painting of surgeon pre sterile surgery Many thanks to Melora for bringing it to my attention Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital The book gathers momentum the topics covered near the end the AIDS crisis of the 80s and 90s the rape and murder of the pregnant 33 year old pathologist Dr Kathryn Hinnant within the walls of the hospital in 1989 Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and finally the care of Dr Craig Spencer who contracted and survived the deadly Ebola virus in 2014 close the book with a bang They are exciting and engagingly told and they all relate directly to the management and underlying spirit of this renowned public hospital I believe such an ending will influence how readers rate the book I am rating the entire book the book as a whole It is interesting throughout but much of it lacks the powerfully engaging feel of the ending In focusing on the history of one hospital Bellevue the author has as well covered the development of medical science in the US from the 1700s up to 2015 Diseases epidemics treatments social conditions and changing attitudes Bellevue began as an almshouse pest house and death house The guiding rule being that no one would ever be turned away a place open to all the diseased the destitute the criminal and the insane A place of last resort that is Bellevue The telling moves forward chronologically We follow The Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1795 the Cholera Epidemic of 1816 the 1847 1848 Typhus Epidemic the long string of resident doctors early attitudes toward dissection in the US and abroad teaching education and the development of associate medical schools discrimination by religion race and gender medical innovations and theories anesthesia germ theory antisepsis and urban sanitation The maimed of the Civil War victims of the Great Influenza and always the poor and down and out of the largest growing urban metropolis in the US New York City Prohibution 1920 1933 the stock market crash in 1929 followed by the Depression the opening in 1933 of the separate Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital seven years in the making with the support of scandal and gossip riddled Tammany Hall politician Mayor Jimmy Walker Dr Lauretta Bender s work with insulin shock therapy and electric shock therapy as head of the children s ward of the asylum What were the effects Lyndon Johnson s Medicare and Medicaid Bill of 1965 and of the deinstitutionalization of the 80s on the homeless and poor and the hospital s clientele We are delivered an overview of how historic world national and events tied directly to New York City played out within the halls of Bellevue Of course this cannot be a complete compendium on the progress of medical science There are numerous quotes but rather than clarifying they often made that being said less rather than clear The quotes were too often ambiguous open ended or with implied innuendos The same is true of the wording in other lines Varying interpretations could be drawn I remarked on several occasions What is that supposed to mean Details were at times excessive I don t necessarily need to know the names of the individuals who died Providing adequate data and yet not overloading is a tricky balance At times my attention wandered and I wished for better editing On completing the book I asked myself why it had not reach up to the quality of David McCullough s nonfiction books Where did the difference lie In McCullough s books the details serve a purpose on the basis of them you can draw meaningful conclusions Excessive details are removed Secondly his characters are introduced with pertinent observations about their respective personalities The reader quickly understands and has a feeling for who each individual is I never felt the slightest sympathy empathy distaste or appreciation for any person mentioned in Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital They are named they are not known McCullough on the other hand recreates live human beings He does this superbly in his biographies but even in books about inanimate objects such as The Great Bridge The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge McCullough draws the readers toward the individuals In The Greater Journey Americans in Paris McCullough brought to life the numerous doctors Both of these books overlap with Bellevue s content The audiobook is very well narrated by Fred Sanders Read clearly and at a good speed One has time to absorb details Not over dramatized Sanders lets the author s words speak for themselves. Bellevue epub free Definitely a good book which I can recommend to others but not as engaging as a book by McCullough Bellevue Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America s Most Storied Hospital
Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital By David M. Oshinsky |
038552336X |
9780385523363 |
384 |
Hardcover |
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Survived a serious surgery because of antiseptics 4 stars: Bellevue aquatic center 12 The Mad House Insane asylum Relevant but a little out of place 3 stars. Bellevue square history 14 Cause of Death Chapter on Denatured alcohol Very good but too short 3 stars. Bellevue bookstore memphis 15 Shocking Truth Introduction of shock therapy on mental patients Good but too short 3 stars, Bellevue ab 16 Survival Discussed the lean years of mid 20th century when finances were crushing the hospital Out of place 2 stars: Bellevue garage 7 The Bellevue Ambulance Very interesting micro history on the first ambulances in the 1870 s 4 stars, Book bellevue 19 Hurricane Sandy Interesting chapter close call to losing power and patients 4 stars, Bellevue toulouse In 2001 Bellevue ramped up to take victims of the World Trade Center attack only to discover an unusual sense of helplessness when few treatable injuries resulted from the incident, Bellevue absence reporting M Pei Pei Cobb Fried designed atrium connecting the old buildings with the new was completed in 2005.18 Rock Bottom Similar to chapter 16 2 stars.20 Rebirth Mildly interesting chapter 3 stars.3..