The Handbook of Medical Sociology is published about once in a decade by Vanderbilt University Press. The most recent edition (2010, ISBN 978-0826517203) is a 512-page volume edited by Chloe E. Bird, Peter Conrad, Allen M. Fremont and Stefan Timmermans. Like most such textbooks every chapter is written by a different expert/group of experts.
The first part of the book evaluates how different socioecomical conditions like education, gender, race/ethnicity and neighbourhood affect health, and why. For example, does education lead to better health because more educated (and thus wealthier) people can make better lifestyle choices or because they have access to better care? Or is it because they don't have to worry about money and thus have less stress?
The second part of the book is about experiences of illness and disability, as well as a chapter on the right to die movement. The third part is mostly about healthcare, also including a chapter about evidence-based medicine.
The last part is titled "Crosscutting issues," which is mostly about contemporary subjects, from biological weapons to genes. It depends on the interests of the reader, but this author found it the most valuable part.
Chapters of Interest
The chapter on social construction of illnesses focuses on two subjects: the idea of illnesses as social construct and the concept of contested illnesses. The former part is very interesting, but the latter part is undermined by grave medical errors that show it was written by a sociologist. This chapter is strangely also full of typos.
The chapter about Internet and the experience of illness is interesting, even though the authors do not seem to be very knowledgeable about the technical side of things. Some particularly fascinating descriptions include those of pro ana groups and "amputee wannabes" (though for some reason the so-called "devotees" of this same "scene" are not mentioned).
The article about evidence-based medicine is intriguing and thought-provoking, but does not delve very deeply into all possible problems of EBM. The chapters about biomarkers and gene-environment interaction in the context of medical sociology show in an eye-opening manner how these subjects are relevant from a sociological perspective.
The last chapter in the book is about life extension, with the view that it is motivated by individualism. About half-way through the article sadly begins to lose wind and ends up as a rambling with the main point seemingly being that life extension increases inequality (as children with AIDS will still be dying in Africa).
Review
Many of the articles in The Handbook of Medical Sociology are fairly U.S. centric in scope. Still, it seems like the purpose of some of the chapters is to delineate data, while others are more about discussion of research methods and different areas and aspects of medical sociology.
The book is quite up to date with its topics, with several chapters examining themes related to the Internet. A few important topics could be considered lacking, but the concept of this textbook "series" is that articles in earlier editions complement newer ones - it is not possible to fit everything in a single book.
Some of the articles had quite a few typos and there was one table on page 95 with a glaringly obvious mathematical error (percentages were added together in a situation where it makes no sense). The index could also have been improved. Overall, however, both the quality of the articles and the editing was good.
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