Scielo RSS http://scielo.isciii.es/rss.php?pid=0211-953620080001&lang=en vol. 28 num. lang. en http://scielo.isciii.es/img/en/fbpelogp.gif http://scielo.isciii.es http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100001&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100002&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en The economic depression of the 1930s represented the most important economic and social crisis of its time. Surprisingly, its effect on health did not show in available morbidity and mortality rates. In 1932, the League of Nations Health Organisation embarked on a six-point program addressing statistical methods of measuring the effect and its influence on mental health and nutrition and establishing ways to safeguard public health through more efficient health systems. Some of these studies resulted in considerations of general relevance beyond crisis management. Unexpectedly, the crisis offered an opportunity to reconsider key concepts of individual and public health. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100003&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en The first serious attempts to deal with public health problems in Greece were undertaken between 1925 and 1935. This period also witnessed setbacks to developments in public health, caused by the lack of welfare infrastructure for social relief, as well as extensive health problems brought about by the settlement in Greece of 1,300,000 refugees from Asia Minor. In 1928 following the example set by other European countries, the Liberal Government appealed to international health organisations for support in order to effectively deal with these problems. This contribution constitutes a case study addressing the following issues: a) the impact the League of Nations Health Organisation intervention had on the establishment of public health services; b) the framework for a collaboration of the Rockefeller Foundation and the League of Nations Health Organisation; and c) the factors that led to the failure of the health care reorganisation. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100004&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en This article explores the emergence and recognition of silicosis as an occupational disease in interwar Spain. Following International Labour Office guidelines, growing international concerns and local medical evidence, Republican administrators provided the first health care facilities to silicosis sufferers, who eventually became entitled to compensation under the Law of Occupational Diseases (1936), poorly implemented due to the outbreak of the Civil War (1936-39). Silicosis became a priority issue on the political agenda of the new dictatorial regime because it affected lead and coalmining, key sectors for autarchic policies. The Silicosis Scheme (1941) provided compensation for sufferers, although benefits were minimised by its narrow coverage and the application of tight criteria. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100005&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en This paper focuses on the health reforms during the republican Spain (1931-1939) and the crisis derived from the three-year of civil war. It considers how the war affected the health system and the impairment of health conditions of the population during the late 1930s, considering the changing conditions caused by the conflict. Some of the specific topics analysed are the changing healthcare system, the adaptation of health organization after the outbreak of the war, the impact of the war on the health of the population and epidemiological changes, the problem of the refugees and the clinical studies by experts, mainly on undernourishment. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100006&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en This paper follows the social and political history of OZE, the Society for the Preservation of the Health of the Jewish Population, in the interwar period. We focus on two campaigns against typhus and favus, the first two disease oriented efforts by OZE, in order to reconstruct the operational approaches, considerations and obstacles faced by OZE as a Jewish organization and transnational participant in the discourse on the health and politics of minorities between two world wars. The analysis of OZE as a transnational Jewish relief organization has a wider significance as an example of international organizations originating from civil initiatives to promote the health of minorities through field work and politics. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100007&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en This paper focuses on initiatives to improve infant health, as they developed in Norway especially during the interwar period. Falling birth rates were felt as a menace to the survival of the nation and specific initiatives were taken to oppose it. But crises engendered by the reduction in fertility strengthened opportunities for introducing policies to help the fewer children born survive and grow up to become healthy citizens. Legislation supporting mothers started in 1892 increased in the interwar years including economic features. Healthy mother and baby stations and hygienic clinics, aimed at controlling births were developed by voluntary organisations inspired from France and England respectively. A sterilization law (1934) paralleled some German policies. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100008&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en British historians initially saw the interwar period as a "golden age" for public health in local government, with unprecedented preventive and curative powers wielded by Medical Officers of Health (MOsH). In the 1980s Lewis and Webster challenged this reading, arguing that MOsH were overstretched, neglectful of their "watchdog" role and incapable of formulating a new philosophy of preventive medicine. The article first details this critique, then reappraises it in the light of recent demographic work. It then provides a case study of public health administration in South-West England. Its conclusion is that some elements of the Lewis/Webster case now deserve to be revised. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100009&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en Se estudia el significado original de "epidemia" y su posterior identificación con "peste". Originariamente la palabra griega epidēmķa significaba "visita", "llegada", que en el ámbito de la medicina se refería a la visita del médico al paciente o viceversa, mientras que la palabra latina pestis, "peste", hacía referencia a una enfermedad contagiosa inespecífica. Varios textos de autores griegos recogen las distintas acepciones de la palabra epidēmķa. Sin embargo, debido a una interpretación nosocéntrica, epidēmķa significará esencialmente una enfermedad grave, extendida y transmisible como la peste, por lo que tanto "epidemia" como "peste" han venido a coincidir en su significación. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100010&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en En el presente artículo estudiamos algunos de los aspectos más destacados de la recepción del De medicina de Cornelio Celso en la literatura y en la práctica quirúrgica del Renacimiento. Nuestro estudio se centra sobre todo en dos ámbitos: el socioprofesional, con la defensa por parte de los cirujanos de la dignidad de su disciplina, y el relativo a la recepción de las doctrinas celsianas más apreciadas en el siglo XVI. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100011&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en In this essay, I will scrutinize the differences between Galileo's and Huygens's demonstrations of free fall, which can be found respectively in the Discorsi and the Horologium, from a mathematical, representational and methodological perspective. I argue that more can be learnt from such an analysis than the thesis that Huygens re-styled Galilean mechanics which is a communis opinio. I shall argue that the differences in their approach on free fall highlight a significantly different mathematical and methodological outlook. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100012&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en During the 19th century, prostitution aroused strong emotions in most European cities. Palma de Mallorca was no exception and, in common with many Spanish cities at that time, regulated this activity. The objectives of this paper are to analyze the Mallorcan medical discourse on syphilis, evaluate the concept of venereal disease as social stigma and, finally, examine municipal policy on prostitution. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100013&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en The School of Tropical Medicine was founded in 1902 along with the Colonial Hospital of Lisbon. The Portuguese government recognized the importance of colonising the tropics and therefore supported the creation of a specific locus of medical training that would prove to be crucial to the clinical and experimental study of tropical diseases. This paper examines the importance of such institutions for the emergence of a new scientific area of research while also functioning as a consolidation factor for the Third Portuguese Colonial Empire. The creation of a new concept of medical practice with respect to tropical diseases characterizes a specific aspect of colonization: it underlies and drives the discourse of colonization itself. Consultation of data collected by the Portuguese Tropical School and the Colonial Hospital during the period between 1902 and 1935, the starting point of the present study, seeks to shed light on the ongoing debate concerning the history of tropical medicine within European colonial discourse. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100014&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en Entre las fuentes para una historia social de la terapéutica en México, es pertinente analizar la producción de sus laboratorios farmacéuticos, aún cuando reflejen de manera limitada e indirecta la práctica terapéutica misma. Una primera aproximación a los extractos fluidos de los Laboratorios Codex producidos en el segundo cuarto del siglo XX, permite destacar la diversidad florística de la materia prima empleada en ellos y sus propiedades terapéuticas, avaladas entonces por las autoridades regulatorias. Las indicaciones terapéuticas de los extractos abarcaban una gama amplia de padecimientos, y el 45,8% de las especies utilizadas eran de procedencia nacional. La figura de los extractos fluidos permitía al clínico acceder al potencial de la flora medicinal, facilitando la flexibilidad prescriptiva en combinaciones y proporciones definidas en función de la condición cambiante del enfermo. Sin embargo, setenta años después, muchos de esos extractos, elaborados por la empresa originada en la empresa Codex, carecen de aval oficial como recursos terapéuticos en sí, incluso en ausencia de estudios que invaliden expresamente las atribuciones registradas entonces. Los productos atestiguan indirectamente, en su origen e indicaciones, un momento de transición en la producción farmacéutica y en la evolución de la terapéutica biomédica en México. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100015&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en In 1965, 71% of legal abortions in the United States were performed using the surgical procedure of dilation and curettage. By 1972, a mere seven years later, approximately the same percentage (72.6%) of legal abortions in the United States were performed using a completely new abortion technology: the electrical vacuum aspirator. This article examines why, in less than a decade, electric vacuum suction became American physicians' abortion technology of choice. It focuses on factors such as political and professional feasibility (the technology was able to complement the decriminalization of abortion in the US, and the interests, abilities, commitments, and personal beliefs of physicians); clinical compatibility (it met physician/patient criteria such as safety, simplicity and effectiveness); and economic viability (it was able to adapt to market factors such as production, cost, supply/demand, availability, and distribution). http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100016&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en Dans cet article, l'auteur analyse l'évolution de la notion de handicap en s'intéressant aux deux classifications du handicap publiées par l'OMS, en 1980 puis en 2001. La "Classification Internationale du Handicap: déficiences, incapacités et désavantages. Un manuel de classification des conséquences des maladies", de 1980, prolonge la "Classification Internationales des Maladies"; le handicap y désigne les conséquences sociales des maladies. Dans la "Classification Internationale du Fonctionnement, du Handicap et de la Santé", publiée en 2001, le handicap désigne un "défaut de fonctionnement" et est associé à la notion de santé. L'auteur s'intéresse à la question de la norme de référence utilisée dans les classifications pour définir le handicap. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100017&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en Dans cet article, l'auteur analyse l'évolution de la notion de handicap en s'intéressant aux deux classifications du handicap publiées par l'OMS, en 1980 puis en 2001. La "Classification Internationale du Handicap: déficiences, incapacités et désavantages. Un manuel de classification des conséquences des maladies", de 1980, prolonge la "Classification Internationales des Maladies"; le handicap y désigne les conséquences sociales des maladies. Dans la "Classification Internationale du Fonctionnement, du Handicap et de la Santé", publiée en 2001, le handicap désigne un "défaut de fonctionnement" et est associé à la notion de santé. L'auteur s'intéresse à la question de la norme de référence utilisée dans les classifications pour définir le handicap. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100018&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en Dans cet article, l'auteur analyse l'évolution de la notion de handicap en s'intéressant aux deux classifications du handicap publiées par l'OMS, en 1980 puis en 2001. La "Classification Internationale du Handicap: déficiences, incapacités et désavantages. Un manuel de classification des conséquences des maladies", de 1980, prolonge la "Classification Internationales des Maladies"; le handicap y désigne les conséquences sociales des maladies. Dans la "Classification Internationale du Fonctionnement, du Handicap et de la Santé", publiée en 2001, le handicap désigne un "défaut de fonctionnement" et est associé à la notion de santé. L'auteur s'intéresse à la question de la norme de référence utilisée dans les classifications pour définir le handicap. http://scielo.isciii.es/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0211-95362008000100019&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en Dans cet article, l'auteur analyse l'évolution de la notion de handicap en s'intéressant aux deux classifications du handicap publiées par l'OMS, en 1980 puis en 2001. La "Classification Internationale du Handicap: déficiences, incapacités et désavantages. Un manuel de classification des conséquences des maladies", de 1980, prolonge la "Classification Internationales des Maladies"; le handicap y désigne les conséquences sociales des maladies. Dans la "Classification Internationale du Fonctionnement, du Handicap et de la Santé", publiée en 2001, le handicap désigne un "défaut de fonctionnement" et est associé à la notion de santé. L'auteur s'intéresse à la question de la norme de référence utilisée dans les classifications pour définir le handicap.