The Gospel of Good Obstetrics
Joseph Bolivar DeLee's Vision for Childbirth in the United States
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12209810 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Carolyn Herbst Lewis (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2015 |
| Volume | 29 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 112-130 |
| Publication date | 2015-08-27 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Social History of Medicine (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0951-631X • E-ISSN: 1477-4666 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1093/shm/hkv077 |
| OpenAlex | W2548609292 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 6 |
This article reconsiders the place of obstetrician Joseph Bolivar DeLee in the historical narrative. Often celebrated as a founding father of the profession, and denigrated as one of the leading proponents of instrumental childbirth, DeLee was not entirely the man historians and childbirth activists blame him for being. Rather than seeking to resolve the contradiction between DeLee's widely cited professional writings and his lesser known practices, this article instead focuses on the broader tenure of DeLee's career, particularly his ‘Gospel of Good Obstetrics’. Doing so permits us to see the efforts of a physician who spent nearly 50 years defending the advantages of home birth without anaesthesia and without instrumentation and who built institutions that provided Chicago mothers with these birthing experiences. This article also explores how DeLee envisioned his techniques and institutions as the basis for an obstetrics revolution in the United States
Art · Blame · Childbirth · Contradiction · Epistemology · Gospel · Literature · Narrative · Obstetrics · Obstetrics and gynaecology · Pregnancy · Psychiatry · Sociology · Medical History and Innovations · Medicine · History · Philosophy
| Citations per year | 0.13 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2018 - 2018 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |