Identifying disease in the past: Cutting the gordian knot

Asclepio

Volumn 54, Issue 1, 2002, Pages 13-34

  Cunningham, Andrew ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE   (United Kingdom)

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EID: 33750599465     PISSN: 02104466     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.3989/asclepio.2002.v54.i1.133     Document Type: Article

References (27)

1. Wilson, A. (2000), «On the History of Disease Concepts: The Case of Pleurisy», History of Science 38, 271-319; the quotations are from page 275.
2. Wilson, A. (2000), «On the History of Disease Concepts: The Case of Pleurisy», History of Science 38, 271-319; the quotations are from page 275.
3. This criticism of the pursuit of a history of concepts of disease, I hope to justify at length in the larger work of which the present essay is a preliminary part. A second problem with trying to write a history of disease concepts is that when we ask 'What is a disease concept a concept of?' the answer still has to be disease. So disease-the very category which is problematic here-remains the focus in this approach, and its ontological status still goes unexplored, or appears to be begged.
4. Prescott, D. M. and Flexer, A. S. (1986), Cancer: the Misguided Cell, Sunderland, Massachusetts, Sinauer Associates Inc. Another author calls cancer 'the wayward cell'.
5. All this was rationalised by my father in a way which made cancer irrelevant as a possible cause. As he knew sections of his bowel had been removed (though did not ask why) it was obvious to him that there was not enough intestine left to detain and absorb the food long enough to nourish him. As he noticed that his food just 'fell straight through' him, he was not at all surprised he was fading away. He explained all this to me. Very slowly.
6. Breslow, L. and D. M. Breslow (1982), «Historical Perspectives [on cancer epidemiology and prevention]», Cancer Epidemiology and Prevention, Schottenfeld, D. and J. F. Fraumeni, eds., Philadelphia, W. B. Saunders Co. 1039-1048, 1040.
7. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
8. Graunt, J. (1672), Natural and Political Observations Mentioned in a following Index, and made upon the Bills of Mortality. By John Graunt, Citizen of London. With Reference to the Government, Religion, Trade, Growth, Ayre, Diseases, and the several Changes of the said City, London, John Martin, James Allestry and Tho. Dicas, 1.
9. For an extensive series of them, and information about their history, see [Heberden, W., Ed.] (1759), A Collection of the Yearly Bills of Mortality from 1657 to 1758 inclusive. Together with several other Bills of an earlier Date. To which are subjoined 1. Natural and Political Observations on the bills of mortality: by Capt. John Graunt, F. R.S. reprinted from the sixth edition, in 1676. II. Another essay in political arithmetic, concerning the growth of London; with measures, periods, causes, and consequences thereof. By Sir William Petty, Kt. F.R.S. reprinted from the edition printed at London in 1683. III. Observations on the past growth and present state of the city of London; reprinted from the edition printed at London in 1751; with a continuation of the tables to the end of the year 1757. By Corbyn Morris Esq; F.R.S. IV. A comparative view of the diseases and ages, and a table of the probabilities of life, for the last thirty years. By J. P. esq; F.R.S., London, A. Millar.
10. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
11. I appreciate that some of these are conventionally taken to have been renamed later, and thus are conventionally taken to correspond to modern diseases (for instance, both consumption and the King's Evil were supposedly later reclassified as tuberculosis). I shall deal in the larger version of this paper with what happens in such reclassifications, and show that as a consequence of how reclassification takes place, the earlier disease does not in fact correspond with the modern one.
12. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
13. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
14. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
15. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
16. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
17. Eyler, J. M. (1979), Victorian Social Medicine. The Ideas and Methods of William Farr, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 8, quoting Farr's own aims for his journal British Annals of Medicine.
18. See Martin, J. (1990), «Sauvages's Nosology: Medical Enlightenment in Montpellier», The Medical Enlightenment of the Eighteenth Century, Cunningham, A. and R. French, eds., Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 111-37.
19. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
20. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
21. (1842), Fourth Annual Report of the Registrar-General of Births, Deaths, and Marriages in England, London, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 199-205.
22. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
23. On the history of the International Classification, see (1977), International Classification of Diseases. Manual of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases, Injuries, and Causes of Death. Based on the Recommendations of the Ninth Revision Conference, 1975, and Adopted by the Twentyninth World Health Assembly, Geneva, World Health Organization, Introduction.
24. «Report: Death Registrations 1999: cause England and Wales», Health Statistics Quarterly (2000), n. p. The table is five pages long, and only pages one to three are reproduced here.
25. (1980), ICD.9. CM The International Classification of Diseases 9th Revision Clinical Modification, Washington, U.S. Department of Health and Human Sciences, vol. 1, Preface.
26. See for instance Greenwood, M. (1948), Medical Statistics from Graunt to Farr, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
27. Cunningham, A. (1992), «Transforming Plague: The Laboratory and the Identity of Infectious Disease», The Laboratory Revolution in Medicine, Cunningham, A. and P. Williams, eds., Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp. 209-44.