Experiment Perilous: Physicians and Patients Facing the Unknown

by Renée C. Fox

This is a brilliant work of lasting value to both sociology and anthropology by a person combining the talent of keen observer with the highest level of theoretical sophistication. . . a major contribution to our understanding of the nature and structure of a significant social situation.--David M. Schneider, The University of Chicago. Experiment Perilous covers a three-year period In the lives of the patients and physicians in a small and intense hospital community. It represents a pioneering, participant-observation-based study of a hospital ward as a social system. In a new epilogue. Fox provides a historical and sociological account of phenomena relevant to clinical investigations that she has observed in her forty-five years as a sociologist of medicine.

290 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 1, 1974

Reviews

[Aaron Zau · Rating 2 out of 5]

Me resulta complicado colocar una valoración que haga justicia a este libro. Aunque no se puede obviar que es hijo de su tiempo -la autora, discípula de Parsons, hace gala de un cándido funcionalismo-, siento que que hay tanto potencial desaprovechado…
Que en el epílogo, 45 años después de su publicación, no haga ni el mínimo gesto crítico, tampoco ayuda.

Como sea, contiene ideas interesantes. La más, en mi opinión, es la de las ambigüedades morales en la relación entre las figuras del paciente-sujeto de investigación/médico-investigador.