Practiced Healing: Case Studies in the Medical History of the American West, 1860--1900

This study offers four case studies showing how medical practitioners in the American West implemented new treatments for disease in their practice during the years from 1860 to 1900. The four chapters give the examples of calomel treatment, the use of tuberculin serum to cure tuberculosis, the development of anti-toxin for diphtheria, and the controversy surrounding the diagnosis of railway spine. I argue that medical innovation was not a direct process that resulted in changing medical practices in the West, but was complicated by sectarian boundaries, the force of tradition in medical practice, and a distrust of science-based medicine. Moreover, my research revealed several distinctive trends in my research about western medical practice during the latter half of the nineteenth century: the persistent influence of army physicians in medical communities; the influence of railroads on medical practice; and the tension between allopathic practitioners and their eclectic counterparts.