Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Inventor

  • Reminiscences of a medical student in Australia

    Some years ago a tourist shown the shopping Galleria in Milan asked the guide why the ceiling paintings illustrating the world’s continents did not include Australia. The guide explained that Australia had yet to be invented. She was clearly misinformed in that the British had… Read more

  • Whose name is writ in water: Life, serendipity, and fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva

    Carol Zapata-WhelanFresno, California, United States “… I guess [the grass] is the handkerchief of the Lord,A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners, that we may see and remark, and say Whose?”—Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass I sank down… Read more

  • The Turk’s Head Literary Club

    Elizabeth SteinhartJMS PearceHull, England We share a fascination for the varied activities, relics, and quirky names of eighteenth- and nineteenth-centuries’ gentlemen’s clubs and societies. One of us (ES) recently found the blue plaque of the Turk’s Head Literary Club above a Chinese supermarket in London’s… Read more

  • Paul Farmer, MD (1959–2022)

    Paul Edward Farmer was an American medical pioneer anthropologist, academician, and physician. He co-founded and was chief strategist of Partners in Health (PIH), an international nonprofit organization that since 1987 has provided health care services, undertaken research, and advocacy on behalf of the poor and… Read more

  • The Art of Medicine is the essence of medical professionalism

    Patrick FiddesAustralia The art consists in three things—the disease, the patient, and the physician. The physician is the servant of the art.1 Among the 412 aphorisms in Francis Adam’s Genuine Works Of Hippocrates2 are three that employ the term “Art.” Two have achieved popular acclaim… Read more

  • Margaret Mead (1901–1978), controversial anthropologist pioneer

    Margaret Mead is remembered as one of the most important, though controversial, anthropologists of the twentieth century. She became famous through her classic work Coming of Age in Samoa (1928), in which she described the life and sexual practices of teenagers on two Samoan islands… Read more

  • Faith and symphony: Anton Bruckner’s trials and triumphs

    Michael YafiChaden YafiHouston, Texas, United States Immersed in the music, the young composer conducted the orchestra with such fervor that he scarcely noticed that more than half the audience had slipped away. When the symphony came to its final notes, instead of the applause he… Read more

  • The history of eyeglasses

    Efforts to improve vision date back to the ancient civilizations of India and China. Greek scholars such as Ptolemy and Euclid endeavored to understand the physics of light refraction, the mechanisms of lenses, and how their properties can enhance vision and literacy. The Romans magnified… Read more

  • James Parsons, physician and linguist (1705–1770)

    Born in Devon and educated in Dublin, James Parsons studied medicine in Paris and became doctor of medicine at Rheims in 1736. Appointed physician to the public infirmary of St. Giles in 1738, he began an obstetric practice in London and became a Fellow of… Read more

  • Physicians of the American Revolution

    Kevin LoughlinBoston, Massachusetts, United States As the American Revolution began in 1775, the practice of medicine in the colonies was still in its nascent stages. There were only two medical schools in North America: the University of Pennsylvania, founded in 1765 by John Morgan and… Read more

  • Epidemic autism?

    JMS PearceHull, England All the features that characterize Asperger’s syndrome can be found in varying degrees in the normal population.—JK Wing, Asperger’s syndrome: a clinical account” Impairment in social interaction, communication, and repetitive and stereotyped behavior characterize autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The prevalence of Kanner’s… Read more

  • Sam McGee, Dan, and me

    Julius BonelloPeoria, Illinois, United States We had just finished an endoscopic procedure and the patient had left the room. We were scurrying around in the dark getting ready for the next patient. As ‘50s and ‘60s music  played in the background, we challenged each other… Read more