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Bellevue
- Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 14 hrs and 41 mins
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Publisher's summary
From a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian comes a riveting history of New York's iconic public hospital that charts the turbulent rise of American medicine.
Bellevue Hospital, on New York City's East Side, occupies a colorful and horrifying place in the public imagination: a den of mangled crime victims, vicious psychopaths, assorted derelicts, lunatics, and exotic-disease sufferers. In its two and a half centuries of service, there was hardly an epidemic or social catastrophe - or groundbreaking scientific advance - that did not touch Bellevue.
David Oshinsky, whose last book, Polio: An American Story, was awarded a Pulitzer Prize, chronicles the history of America's oldest hospital and in so doing also charts the rise of New York to the nation's preeminent city, the path of American medicine from butchery and quackery to a professional and scientific endeavor, and the growth of a civic institution. From its origins in 1738 as an almshouse and pesthouse, Bellevue today is a revered public hospital bringing first-class care to anyone in need. With its diverse, ailing, and unprotesting patient population, the hospital was a natural laboratory for the nation's first clinical research. It treated tens of thousands of Civil War soldiers, launched the first civilian ambulance corps and the first nursing school for women, pioneered medical photography and psychiatric treatment, and spurred New York City to establish the country's first official board of health.
As medical technology advanced, "voluntary" hospitals began to seek out patients willing to pay for their care. For charity cases it was left to Bellevue to fill the void. The latter decades of the 20th century brought rampant crime, drug addiction, and homelessness to the nation's struggling cities - problems that called a public hospital's very survival into question. It took the AIDS crisis to cement Bellevue's enduring place as New York's ultimate safety net, the iconic hospital of last resort.
Lively, pause-resisting, fascinating, Bellevue is essential American history.
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For Chinese immigrant Wong Chut King, surviving in San Francisco meant a life in the shadows. His passing on March 6, 1900, would have been unremarkable if a city health officer hadn't noticed a swollen black lymph node on his groin - a sign of bubonic plague. Empowered by racist pseudoscience, officials rushed to quarantine Chinatown while doctors examined Wong's tissue for telltale bacteria. If the devastating disease was not contained, San Francisco would become the American epicenter of an outbreak that had already claimed 10 million lives worldwide.
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Plague, Racism, Public Health..a toxic mix.
- By Steve Adams on 07-11-19
By: David K. Randall
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The Remedy
- Robert Koch, Arthur Conan Doyle, and the Quest to Cure Tuberculosis
- By: Thomas Goetz
- Narrated by: Donald Corren
- Length: 9 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1875, tuberculosis was the deadliest disease in the world, accountable for a third of all deaths. A diagnosis of TB - often called consumption - was a death sentence. Then, in a triumph of medical science, a German doctor named Robert Koch deployed an unprecedented scientific rigor to discover the bacteria that caused TB. Koch soon embarked on a remedy - a remedy that would be his undoing. When Koch announced his cure for consumption, Arthur Conan Doyle, then a small-town doctor in England and sometime writer, went to Berlin to cover the event.
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thought-provoking
- By Jean on 07-06-14
By: Thomas Goetz
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An American Plague
- The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793
- By: Jim Murphy
- Narrated by: Pat Bottino
- Length: 3 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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In An American Plague, Jim Murphy tells the story of the 1793 yellow fever epidemic. Bizarre medical practices of the time are discussed, as well as popular historical figures, such as George Washington and Benjamin Rush, who were involved in finding a cure for this horrific outbreak. Pat Bottino's captivating narration adds appeal to this interesting historical tale.
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Don't expect technical depth...
- By Ebird on 01-27-06
By: Jim Murphy
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The Fantastic Laboratory of Dr. Weigl
- How Two Brave Scientists Battled Typhus and Sabotaged the Nazis
- By: Arthur Allen
- Narrated by: Dennis Holland
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Few diseases are more gruesome than typhus. Transmitted by body lice, it afflicts the dispossessed - refugees, soldiers, and ghettoized peoples - causing hallucinations, terrible headaches, boiling fever, and often death. The disease plagued the German army on the Eastern Front and left the Reich desperate for a vaccine. For this they turned to the brilliant and eccentric Polish zoologist Rudolf Weigl.
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An Unforgettable book
- By Jean on 09-01-14
By: Arthur Allen
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Beating Back the Devil
- By: Maryn McKenna
- Narrated by: Ellen Archer
- Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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The universal instinct is to run from an outbreak of disease. These doctors run toward it. They always keep a bag packed. They seldom have more than 24 hours before they are dispatched. They are told only their country of destination and the epidemic they will tackle when they get there.
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Interesting Stuff - Only criticism is pacing
- By Tim on 07-23-05
By: Maryn McKenna
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How to Survive a Plague
- The Inside Story of How Citizens and Science Tamed AIDS
- By: David France
- Narrated by: Rory O'Malley
- Length: 24 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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A riveting, powerful telling of the story of the grassroots movement of activists, many of them in a life-or-death struggle, who seized upon scientific research to help develop the drugs that turned HIV from a mostly fatal infection to a manageable disease. Ignored by public officials, religious leaders, and the nation at large, and confronted with shame and hatred, this small group of men and women chose to fight for their right to live by educating themselves and demanding to become full partners in the race for effective treatments.
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Read This Book!
- By Kay M Hawklee on 05-30-17
By: David France
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Teeth
- The Story of Beauty, Inequality, and the Struggle for Oral Health in America
- By: Mary Otto
- Narrated by: Suehyla El'Attar
- Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins
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Teeth takes listeners on a disturbing journey into America's silent epidemic of oral disease, exposing the hidden connections between tooth decay and stunted job prospects, low educational achievement, social mobility, and the troubling state of our public health.
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Content everyone should know; dismal narration
- By Elaine on 08-04-17
By: Mary Otto
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Pale Rider
- The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World
- By: Laura Spinney
- Narrated by: Paul Hodgson
- Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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In this gripping narrative history, Laura Spinney traces the overlooked pandemic to reveal how the virus travelled across the globe, exposing mankind's vulnerability and putting our ingenuity to the test. As socially significant as both world wars, the Spanish flu dramatically disrupted - and often permanently altered - global politics, race relations, and family structures while spurring innovation in medicine, religion, and the arts.
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A Predilection for Those in the Prime of Life
- By Cynthia on 02-12-18
By: Laura Spinney
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Five Days at Memorial
- Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital
- By: Sheri Fink
- Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
- Length: 17 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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After Hurricane Katrina struck and power failed, amid rising floodwaters and heat, exhausted staff at Memorial Medical Center designated certain patients last for rescue. Months later, a doctor and two nurses were arrested and accused of injecting some of those patients with life-ending drugs.
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Five Days in Hell/Years in Purgatory
- By Cynthia on 09-15-13
By: Sheri Fink
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Get Well Soon
- History's Worst Plagues and the Heroes Who Fought Them
- By: Jennifer Wright
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1518, in a small town in Alsace, Frau Troffea began dancing and didn't stop. She danced until she was carried away six days later, and soon 34 more villagers joined her. Then more. In a month more than 400 people had been stricken by the mysterious dancing plague. In late-19th-century England an eccentric gentleman founded the No Nose Club in his gracious townhome - a social club for those who had lost their noses, and other body parts, to the plague of syphilis for which there was then no cure.
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Didn't know syphilis could be so fascinating.
- By Kindle Customer on 02-09-17
By: Jennifer Wright
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Dr. Benjamin Rush
- The Founding Father Who Healed a Wounded Nation
- By: Harlow Giles Unger
- Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 9 hrs and 4 mins
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A revealing biography of Dr. Benjamin Rush - fiery signer of the Declaration of Independence, prominent physician, ardent politician, zealous social reformer, passionate humanitarian, and dedicated educator. Known primarily as America's most influential and leading physician, Rush was also among the first to call for the abolition of slavery, equal rights for women, free education and health care for the poor, slum clearance, citywide sanitation facilities, an end to child labor, and universal public education, among other causes.
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A Great Humanitarian
- By Jean on 10-08-19
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Ugh, the narration!
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Laurel Merlington was the perfect voice to narrate
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Wonderful
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Awesome Book
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Laurel Merlington was the perfect voice to narrate
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Important story of fraud really well told
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This is a thrilling historical account of the worst cholera outbreak in Victorian London and a brilliant exploration of how Dr. John Snow's solution revolutionized the way we think about disease, cities, science, and the modern world.
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It was okay until the end
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In medical school, Matt McCarthy dreamed of being a different kind of doctor - the sort of mythical, unflappable physician who could reach unreachable patients. But when a new admission to the critical care unit almost died his first night on call, he found himself scrambling. Visions of mastery quickly gave way to hopes of simply surviving hospital life, where confidence was hard to come by and no amount of med school training could dispel the terror of facing actual patients.
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"my neurotic inner monologue"
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What listeners say about Bellevue
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Jean
- 12-14-16
Fascinating
I found this book “Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America’s Most Storied Hospital” absolutely fascinating. Oshinsky not only tells the sweeping detailed history of Bellevue but also the history of American medicine, nursing, public health, environmental health, medical research/ education, and public hospitals.
The author states it was one of the first hospitals starting in the 1660s. It is famous not only as a mental hospital but as one of the finest emergency and trauma centers in the country. It has a long history as the leading infectious disease facility treating yellow fever, tuberculosis, AIDS to Ebola. Steven Forster died at Bellevue and Francis Ford Coppola filmed scenes of the Godfather in its morgue.
Oshinsky tells about the hospital’s role during the Civil War caring for the most Union soldiers of any hospital. The author tells of advances in medicine, nursing and ambulance service during the Civil War. Bellevue was the first hospital to have ambulance services starting after the Civil War. They also designed the first horse drawn ambulance used in the City. Through affiliations with medical schools, it became the largest teaching hospital in the country and a leading research facility. Bellevue is the leading research facility on AIDS. Bellevue treats more than 600,000 patients annually.
The book is well written and meticulously researched. Oshinsky writes in a clear, concise way that is easily readable. Oshinsky is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist. This is the first book I have read by Oshinsky. I am looking forward to reading more of his books. Oshinsky builds a strong case for the need of public hospitals. I highly recommend this book.
Fred Sanders does an excellent job narrating the book. Sanders is a stage actor and audiobook narrator.
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37 people found this helpful
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- Ashleigh
- 12-27-16
Saved my commute!!!
My commute is awful. It's not terribly long, but I dread it. Audible has helped a lot, and no book has captivated me as well as this one. Fascinating.
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29 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Jeffrey Samsel
- 12-11-16
More than headlines
I only ever knew of Bellevue by the news reports on TV and newspaper headlines, the rest of the story and the long history of this institution is absolutely fascinating. Bellevue has affected our daily lives in more ways than most of know. This is just a great story, even if history or medicine are not your main interests.
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10 people found this helpful
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- Student
- 05-06-17
Absolutely loved it, must read if you like medical history or the history of New York
This book was fascinating and reminded me why I want to go into medicine. The devotion of Bellevue's staff during crisis after crisis to the most at risk groups - the indigent poor, homosexuals, immigrants, homeless and mental ill patients - is inspiring. The author definitely covers the warts of the hospital too, but he has decidedly positive view of Bellevue's 200+ year history. The narrator had a pleasant voice, not boring but not overly dramatic either. I ended up buying a copy of the book for my mom for Mother's Day (she loves medical history too). Lastly, if you are sensitive to animal suffering, there are two chapters that may upset you; one about a scientist who drowned and poisoned dogs to determine effects on the brain and body as the coroner/medical examiner, and about Hurricane Sandy when many lab animals drowned during the flood. The author is direct though not unnecessarily graphic (the hurricane sandy portion was more manageable to me than the first) so skip those bits if you think that will bother you.
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9 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 12-23-16
tale of two cities
"...we the willing...lead by the unknowing...
...are doing the impossible...for the ungrateful...
...by the time we get done here...we will be qualified...
...to do everything with nothing..."
( bellevue-NYU house staff bathroom wall - 1978 )
? are you intrigued by the inner workings of healthcare
? does the medical history of new york city fascinate you
? are the needs and problems of the poor important to you
if so, david oshinsky has written a throughly terrific book for you
it's the history of indigent medical care in a city constantly re-inventing itself
bellevue has been bravely performing that daunting task for 300 years
trauma, infectious disease, mental illness and drug rehab. predominate
bellevue develops a reputation as a place to train and "...see everything..."
jewish medical students, pushed out by quotas elsewhere, are welcome there
new yorkers are justifiably proud of of bellevue's history and accomplishments
but, as you'd expect, there is a sad undercurrent to all this self congratulation
NYC indifference and parsimony make heroic medical devotion a daily necessity
in the mid 1970's, i finished college ( pre-med ) 90 minutes north of NYC
many of my classmates interviewed and then trained at bellevue-NYU
NYC's impending bankruptcy had left the hospital an insolvent chaotic mess
then a 33 yo pregnant bellevue physician was raped and beaten to death in her office
a manhattan jury later voted 10-2 to absolved bellevue of negligence in her murder
for many of my longtime NYC physician friends, that was the last straw
bill deblasio ran for NYC mayor, in 2013, claiming that there were "...two cities..."
finance, art, entertainment, restaurants and wall street were one city
indigent immigrants, mentally ill drug addicts and the working poor were another
oshinsky tells the brave story "...of the willing..." who seek to care for that 2nd city
NYC is NOT America's leading medical city - Boston, Baltimore, SF etc. out pace it
bellevue's devotion and sacrifice are necessary due to NYC apathy and underfunding
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6 people found this helpful
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- Daryl
- 04-14-17
History, Society, Medicine
This is more than the story of Bellevue or of medicine. It uses Bellevue as a compelling "character" all its own, with a deep influence over medicine and societal change over the course of over 200 years.
It's well-researched, but it is not a dry read or performance. In fact, I found myself sneaking time away to read a chapter or two at a time. The hospital - and medicine itself - opened its doors to eccentric patients and physicians, cutting-edge and barbaric treatments, expensive construction and bureaucratic neglect.
If you're at all interested in New York City, history, medicine, or any combination, pick up this book!
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5 people found this helpful
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- Ashley Swigart
- 01-06-17
A must listen for medical professionals
An intriguing and factual history of the United States first hospital. Hearing the history makes one appreciate how far medicine has come in three centuries.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Calliope
- 09-25-17
Fascinating story of hospital and the city
I thought this was an excellent and interesting book, and I was fascinated at how much the history of the hospital followed the history of the city, and vice versa. I don't think a listener even has to be involved in the medical profession - even those interested in the history of the city will find it worth their time. I had no idea that so many medical firsts originated at Bellevue, and the hospital was known for great quality even while the building seemed to be falling down around them.
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3 people found this helpful
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- E F
- 04-06-17
History of American Hospital No. 1
I love history, and I love medicine, so of course I loved this book. Using the oldest hospital in New York as the framework, this book explores the history of medicine, 17th century until today. I learned a lot from this book and loved every minute of it. The author and narrator did a great job!
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- Eileen
- 02-01-17
Takes you outside the hospital walls
This book tells the story of the building, its' people, it's' history and its' city in an organized and compelling manner. While listening, I was torn between wanting it to slow down because it was so enjoyable and speed up because it was so interesting. Well worth your credit and your time!
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3 people found this helpful