The Impossible Clinic

A Critical Sociology of Evidence-Based Medicine

By Ariane Hanemaayer
Categories: History, Social Sciences, Sociology
Publisher: UBC Press
Hardcover : 9780774862073, 256 pages, November 2019
Paperback : 9780774862080, 256 pages, April 2020
Ebook (PDF) : 9780774862097, 256 pages, November 2019
Ebook (EPUB) : 9780774862103, 256 pages, November 2019
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Table of contents

Introduction

1 Conversations in Medicine: Problematizing Clinical Practice

2 Institutional Sites: McMaster University and Canada’s Contribution to Medical Training

3 Responsibilizing a New Kind of Clinician: Problem-Based Learning

4 Technologies of Regulation: Clinical Practice Guidelines and the Effects of Normalization

5 The Impossible Clinic: Biopolitics, Governmentality, Liberalism

Conclusion

Notes; References; Index

Description

The Impossible Clinic explores the conundrum of evidence-based medicine’s (EBM) attempt to translate evidence from medical research into recommendations for practice. Ironically, when medical institutions combine disciplinary regulations with EBM to produce clinical practice guidelines, the outcomes are antithetical to the aim. Such guidelines fail to increase individual physicians’ capacity to judge – as EBM promises – because they externalize judgment while imposing disciplinary control. The Impossible Clinic is the first book to interrogate the history, practice, and pitfalls of EBM and how it persists due to intersecting relationships between professional medical regulation and liberal governance strategies.

Reviews

This important book provides a thoughtful analysis of shortcomings, but parts of the text are so rich in medical humanities jargon that they are sometimes hard to follow.

- M. Gochfeld