The Transformation of German Academic Medicine, 1750}}}1820 [Paperback]

This book studies the evolution of medical theory and education in Germany between 1750 and 1820.By examining German university medicine between 1750 and 1820, this book presents a new interpretation of the emergence of modern medical science. In contrast to the standard picture of the medical profession before 1800, which treats physicians almost exclusively as healers, Thomas H. Broman argues that healing was only one aspect of a complex professional identity in 1750. This identity would change over the second half of the eighteenth century as some German physicians began to articulate a new sense of professionalism, one that presented the physician as an expert whose therapeutic practices were explicitly derived from scientifically valid theories.By examining German university medicine between 1750 and 1820, this book presents a new interpretation of the emergence of modern medical science. In contrast to the standard picture of the medical profession before 1800, which treats physicians almost exclusively as healers, Thomas H. Broman argues that healing was only one aspect of a complex professional identity in 1750. This identity would change over the second half of the eighteenth century as some German physicians began to articulate a new sense of professionalism, one that presented the physician as an expert whose therapeutic practices were explicitly derived from scientifically valid theories.By examining German university medicine between 1750 and 1820, this book presents a new interpretation of the emergence of modern medical science. It demonstrates that the development of modern medicine as a profession linking theory and practice did not emerge suddenly from the revolutionary transformation of Europe at the opening of the nineteenth century, as Foucault and others have argued. Instead, Thomas H. Broman points to cultural and institutional changes occurring during the second half of the eighteenth century that reshaped both medical theory and physicialc$