Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: geriatrics

  • Jean Astruc, the “compleat physician”

    Jean Astruc was born in 1684 in Sauve, France and studied medicine at Montpellier, graduating in 1703. He then became professor of medicine in Toulouse (1710) and Montpellier (1716), superintendent of the local mineral waters (1721), physician to the king of Poland (1729), and professor of medicine at the royal College of Medicine in Paris…

  • The old women of Francisco Goya

      Time is running out for these two decrepit old crones who clearly have seen better days. In this 1820 painting titled El Tiempo, Francisco Goya shows the figure of Cronos hovering over the two women, ready to sweep them away with a broom into the memory of time. The woman in white, her face…

  • Understanding and combatting ageism in healthcare

    Dane Wanniarachige Dublin, Ireland   “Their last hand to hold” by Emily Nguyen. February 22, 2019. As I waited for the tram on a windy day in Dublin, I noticed an older man wearing a flat cap shuffling unhurriedly towards the busy platform with a noticeable parkinsonian gait. The tram slowed to a halt and…

  • The $84.77 Hospital – St. Vincent

    Terri Sinnott Chicago, Illinois, United States    Bishop Francis Silas Marean Chatard What in the United States could be purchased with $87.44 in 1881?  In that year Bishop Francis Silas Marean Chatard and four Daughters of Charity1 took that sum and funded the first Catholic hospital in Indianapolis. Chatard had been born in 1834 in…

  • The two hemispheres of medicine

    Jeffrey LevineNew York, New York, United States I stared at the blank surface of my drawing pad, confused and frozen in fear. It was slightly larger than a sheet of typing paper but looked like it spread from horizon to horizon. The naked model sat leisurely, unashamed, her eyes fixed on a distant, imaginary cloud…