Doctors of Amsterdam

Holland 's Golden Age of the arts was also a bright era for medical science. Public dissections in the anatomy theatre were a popular attraction, and visitors came from far and wide to view the wonderful anatomy collections of Frederik Ruysch. In the intervening 350 years, every aspect of medicine has changed. In Doctors of Amsterdam Annet Mooij describes the transformation of city infirmaries from shelters for indigent townspeople into centers of highly specialized medical care, of universities from seats of timeless general scholarship into institutions of science and specialization, and of medical research from improvised tests in private rooms into sophisticated experiments in hi-tech university laboratories. All this is set in the city of Amsterdam. Still, events in the Dutch capital cannot be seen in isolation from national and international developments, and these contextual factors receive ample attention. The result is a lively and informative picture of more than three centuries of medicine.