A guide to women's health, including information on breast cancer, AIDS, pregnancy and childbirth, and medical practices and procedures.

    People are eager to know the truths behind the biblical legends and the mysteries that created Christian rites, ceremonies, and codes of behavior. Kuhn argues that the sacred scriptures of Judaism and Christianity do not portray historical truths, but symbolic and mystical metaphors. The spiritual truth encoded in scripture, says Kuhn, is far more important than its literal narrative. Kuhn's research provides a clear understanding of the allegorical interpretations of the scriptures and their significance to a deeper, more profound Christianity. He traces the historical and philosophical origins of Christian thought to illustrate that Jesus was one of many incarnations of an enduring archetype that has surfaced in many religions. In fact, those who wrote the scriptures may have never even intended the focus to be on Jesus, the man. Moreover, Kuhn investigates the problems (psychological, spiritual, and otherwise) that result from a purely historical interpretation of Jesus. In doing so, Kuhn reclaims the mystical power at the core of Christianity's message, which has to do with the "birth" of the inner Christ and the emergence of divine consciousness in humanity.

    During eleven years of daily clinical work, more than five hundred couples have been treated at Masters and Johnson's Reproductive Biology Research Foundation in St. Louis. Here the relationship itself is the patient. The authors stress that there is no uninvolved partner when sex is a problem. Therefore they treat the partners even if only one appears to be sexually dysfunctional. And their therapy techniques have proven successful in 80 percent of all cases treated. The key to this unprecedented record is the role of the dual therapy team. Masters and Johnson have found that it takes both a man and a woman therapist to treat a couple effectively. The dual therapy team acts as a catalyst, encouraging communication between partners when none has existed before. They use psychological and psychological methods of treating impotence, ejaculatory incompetence, premature ejaculation, orgasmic dysfunction in women, vaginismus, and painful intercourse. Basic to all treatment techniques is the premise that attitudes and ignorance rather than any mental or physical illness are responsible for most sexual problems. The two-week rapid therapy program developed by Masters and Johnson includes both counseling and specific instructions for patients to follow in privacy. All results of success or failure reported in Human Sexual Inadequacy Are substantiated by a unique five-year patient follow up program. The concept and format of the therapy program are examined in detail in the first two chapters of the book. Included are discussions of the qualifications for co-therapists and accounts of history-taking techniques and round table talks held by the co-therapists and the couple. A full description follows of the instructions given by the therapists to effect psychosexual reorientation of the marital problems. Analysis of each type of dysfunction, its progression and manifestations, accompanies the important step-by-step explanation of practical treatment methods. Chapters on sexual function and dysfunction of the geriatric population explain how the aging male and female can function sexually even in their eighties if they learn to adjust their sexual activities to the natural changes of aging. Program statistics and a critical review of treatment failures conclude this landmark book. Masters and Johnson estimate that one-half of the marriages in the United States are threatened by sexual dysfunction. The therapy program described in HUMAN SEXUAL INADEQUACY introduces a new era in the effective treatment of these sexual difficulties that prevent the enjoyment of a full sex life and a happy marriage. The exceptionally clear account of their major breakthrough in therapy is a long-needed and invaluable guide to clinical counseling and treatment. In addition, it provides an excellent basis for training programs for professional therapists. HUMAN SEXUAL INADEQUACY is essential reading for all health professionals and introduces a new era in the effective treatment of sexual dysfunction.

    After teaching school for more than a decade, the medical profession gradually became an irresistible calling, and she began applying to medical schools. After being rejected by the leading schools, Geneva Medical School (now Hobart College in Geneva, New York) accepted her admission. Though faced with ostracism and harassment from many of her male colleagues, she persevered, and in 1849 she graduated—first in her class.Blackwell encountered further resistance in her attempts to set up a practice. When New York City’s hospitals refused to offer her any post, she eventually opened up a small dispensary of her own in a slum district. Her perseverance once again paid off, for in 1859 the now greatly enlarged dispensary was incorporated as the New York Infirmary for Women and Children. By 1868, after consultation with Florence Nightingale, she was able to open up the Woman’s Medical College at the infirmary, which remained in operation for thirty-one years. During the American Civil War she performed valuable service by helping to organize the Woman’s Central Association of Relief, which selected and trained nurses for the war, and the U.S. Sanitary Commission.In 1869, Blackwell moved permanently to England, where she established a successful private practice and was appointed professor of gynecology at the London School of Medicine for Women. She retired in 1907.Full of insightful reflections on the philosophy of medicine, women’s education, the evils of slavery, and the nature of American society in the nineteenth century, this unique autobiography will interest scholars and students of women’s studies and the history of science.