by Denise A. Copelton, Gregory L. Weiss
With thorough coverage of inequality in health care access and
practice, this leading textbook is widely acclaimed by instructors as
the most comprehensive of any available. Written in an engaging and
accessible style, with multiple student-friendly features, it integrates
recent research in medical sociology and public health to introduce
students to a wide range of issues affecting health, healing, and health
care today.
This new edition links information on
COVID-19 into each chapter, providing students with a solid
understanding of the social history of medicine; social epidemiology;
social stress; health and illness behavior; the profession of medicine;
nurses and allied health workers; complementary and alternative
medicine; the physician-patient relationship; medical ethics; and the
financing and organization of medical care.
Important changes and enhancements in the eleventh edition include:
- Inclusion
of material on COVID-19 in the main text of every chapter, with special
sections at the end of each chapter exploring additional intersections
of COVID-19 with chapter content.
- Expanded coverage of fundamental cause theory and the social determinants of health.
- New
centralized discussions of how and why social disparities in race,
class, gender, and sexual identity impact health outcomes in the United
States.
- New “In
the Field” boxed inserts on topics such as medical education and student
debt, physicians’ use of medical jargon, and corporate greed.
- New
“In Comparative Focus” boxed inserts on topics such as the 1918
influenza pandemic, infant and maternal mortality in Afghanistan, the
patient care coordination process, drug prices, long-term care, and
global health.
- A more in-depth look at both physician and nursing shortages.
- Expanded discussion of nurse burnout during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Curricular and pedagogical changes in medical schools.
- Discussion of continued changes in the financing of the US health care system.
- A more in-depth look at quality concerns in nursing homes.
- Increased attention to the health care systems in Norway, Germany, Cuba, and Mexico.
