Cinema, MD: A History of Medicine On Screen

Cinema, MD follows the intersection of medicine and film and how filmmakers wrote a history of medicine over time. The narrative follows several main story lines: How did the portrayal of physicians, nurses, and medical institutions change over the years? What interested filmmakers, and which topics had priority? What does film's obsession with experiments and monstrosities reveal about medical ethics and malpractice? How could the public's perception of the medical profession change when watching these films on diseases and treatments, including palliative care and medical ethics? Are screenwriters, actors, and film directors channeling a popular view of medicine? Cinema, MD analyzes not only changing practices, changing morals, and changing expectations but also medical stereotypes, medical activism, and violations of patients' integrity and autonomy. Examining over 400 films with medical themes over a century of cinema, this book establishes the cultural, medical, and historical importance of the art form. Film allows us to see our humanity, our frailty, and our dependence when illness strikes. Cinema, MD provides uniquely new and fascinating insight into both film criticism and the history of medicine and has a resonance to the medical world we live in today.

About the Author

Eelco Wijdicks is Professor of Neurology at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, Rochester Minnesota, and Associate Professor of the History of Medicine. He has written on film in Neurology, JAMA Neurology, Neurology Today, The Lancet Neurology and Mayo Clinic Proceedings. His book Neurocinema: When Film Meets Neurology was published in 2015.