Cesarean Section: An American History of Risk, Technology, and Consequence

Author:   Jacqueline H. Wolf (Professor of the History of Medicine and Chair, Ohio University)
Publisher:   Johns Hopkins University Press
Edition:   3rd edition
ISBN:  

9781421438115


Pages:   336
Publication Date:   26 May 2020
Format:   Paperback
Availability:   Manufactured on demand   Availability explained
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Cesarean Section: An American History of Risk, Technology, and Consequence


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Overview

Why have cesarean sections become so commonplace in the United States? Between 1965 and 1987, the cesarean section rate in the United States rose precipitously—from 4.5 percent to 25 percent of births. By 2009, one in three births was by cesarean, a far higher number than the 5–10% rate that the World Health Organization suggests is optimal. While physicians largely avoided cesareans through the mid-twentieth century, by the early twenty-first century, cesarean section was the most commonly performed surgery in the country. Although the procedure can be lifesaving, how—and why—did it become so ubiquitous? Cesarean Section is the first book to chronicle this history. In exploring the creation of the complex social, cultural, economic, and medical factors leading to the surgery's increase, Jacqueline H. Wolf describes obstetricians' reliance on assorted medical technologies that weakened the skills they had traditionally employed to foster vaginal birth. She also reflects on an unsettling malpractice climate—prompted in part by a raft of dubious diagnoses—that helped to legitimize ""defensive medicine,"" and a health care system that ensured cesarean birth would be more lucrative than vaginal birth. In exaggerating the risks of vaginal birth, doctors and patients alike came to view cesareans as normal and, increasingly, as essential. Sweeping change in women's lives beginning in the 1970s cemented this markedly different approach to childbirth. Wolf examines the public health effects of a high cesarean rate and explains how the language of reproductive choice has been used to discourage debate about cesareans and the risks associated with the surgery. Drawing on data from nineteenth- and early twentieth-century obstetric logs to better represent the experience of cesarean surgery for women of all classes and races, as well as interviews with obstetricians who have performed cesareans and women who have given birth by cesarean, Cesarean Section is the definitive history of the use of this surgical procedure and its effects on women's and children's health in the United States.

Full Product Details

Author:   Jacqueline H. Wolf (Professor of the History of Medicine and Chair, Ohio University)
Publisher:   Johns Hopkins University Press
Imprint:   Johns Hopkins University Press
Edition:   3rd edition
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 2.20cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.454kg
ISBN:  

9781421438115


ISBN 10:   1421438119
Pages:   336
Publication Date:   26 May 2020
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand   Availability explained
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The Epitome of Risk 2. Still Too Risky? 3. Risk or Remedy? 4. Assessing Risk 5. Inflating Risk 6. Operating in a Culture of Risk 7. Giving Birth in a Culture of Risk Notes Glossary Works Cited Index

Reviews

Wolf draws from an impressive array of medical archives, medical literature, popular women's magazines, secondary source material, and her own oral history interviews. The outcome is a monograph that contemplates the complex factors behind the evolution of risk, technology, and birthing. Wolf deftly crafts a narrative that uses the stories of women's recollections of their birthing experience as well as those of physicians as way to reinforce her historical analysis of medical sources and data... Cesarean Section will appeal to those interested in women's history and medical history as well as the relationship between culture, risk, and technology. --Bulletin of the History of Medicine An outstanding and fascinating contribution to the history of medicine, women's history, and modern social history. Ambitious in its chronological scope, accessibly written, and convincingly argued, Cesarean Section offers new and original insight into the history of childbirth, as well as important broader matters, such as medical power, the technologization of hospitals, and the ethics of modern medical care. --Canadian Bulletin of Medical History


An outstanding and fascinating contribution to the history of medicine, women's history, and modern social history. Ambitious in its chronological scope, accessibly written, and convincingly argued, Cesarean Section offers new and original insight into the history of childbirth, as well as important broader matters, such as medical power, the technologization of hospitals, and the ethics of modern medical care. * Canadian Bulletin of Medical History * Wolf draws from an impressive array of medical archives, medical literature, popular women's magazines, secondary source material, and her own oral history interviews. The outcome is a monograph that contemplates the complex factors behind the evolution of risk, technology, and birthing. Wolf deftly crafts a narrative that uses the stories of women's recollections of their birthing experience as well as those of physicians as a way to reinforce her historical analysis of medical sources and data . . . Cesarean Section will appeal to those interested in women's history and medical history as well as the relationship between culture, risk, and technology. * Bulletin of the History of Medicine * Cesarean Section is a must-read for anyone interested in the history of childbirth or surgery, but also those who want to read a focused case study on the evolution of medical technologies and practices in modern America. Wolf certainly makes a major contribution to the literature on reproductive health and childbirth, but her ambitious scope and methodologies-particularly the idea of risk and her use of oral histories-offer a lot to a more general audience. It would make a welcome addition to syllabi for medical and women's history classes, particularly at the graduate level. -- Kelly S. O'Donnell, Thomas Jefferson University * Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences * Wolf's Cesarean Section is a compelling study of the procedure in the history of medicine. Her skillfully balanced monograph makes extensive use of a number of primary sources . . . This book could easily be used in a history of science and medicine course due to its accessibility. -- John A. Carranza * Synapsis *


An outstanding and fascinating contribution to the history of medicine, women's history, and modern social history. Ambitious in its chronological scope, accessibly written, and convincingly argued, Cesarean Section offers new and original insight into the history of childbirth, as well as important broader matters, such as medical power, the technologization of hospitals, and the ethics of modern medical care. * Canadian Bulletin of Medical History * Wolf draws from an impressive array of medical archives, medical literature, popular women's magazines, secondary source material, and her own oral history interviews. The outcome is a monograph that contemplates the complex factors behind the evolution of risk, technology, and birthing. Wolf deftly crafts a narrative that uses the stories of women's recollections of their birthing experience as well as those of physicians as a way to reinforce her historical analysis of medical sources and data... Cesarean Section will appeal to those interested in women's history and medical history as well as the relationship between culture, risk, and technology. * Bulletin of the History of Medicine * Cesarean Section is a must-read for anyone interested in the history of childbirth or surgery, but also those who want to read a focused case study on the evolution of medical technologies and practices in modern America. Wolf certainly makes a major contribution to the literature on reproductive health and childbirth, but her ambitious scope and methodologies-particularly the idea of risk and her use of oral histories-offer a lot to a more general audience. It would make a welcome addition to syllabi for medical and women's history classes, particularly at the graduate level. -- Kelly S. O'Donnell, Thomas Jefferson University * Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences * Wolf's Cesarean Section is a compelling study of the procedure in the history of medicine. Her skillfully balanced monograph makes extensive use of a number of primary sources... This book could easily be used in a history of science and medicine course due to its accessibility. -- John A. Carranza * Synapsis *


Author Information

Jacqueline H. Wolf is a professor of the history of medicine at Ohio University. The author of Don't Kill Your Baby: Public Health and the Decline of Breastfeeding in the 19th and 20th Centuries and Deliver Me from Pain: Anesthesia and Birth in America, she is the host and executive producer of the podcast Lifespan: Stories of Illness, Accident, and Recovery.

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