The review considers the approach placing famous French surgeon A. Paré into more general European context of European Renaissance of XVI century and into local context of intellectual life of Paris of this period. The refutation of widespread in history of medicine opinion about strict separation of university medicine from artisan surgery in Medieval Europe is discussed.

The persistent use of neurasthenia in Asia, an out-dated diagnostic category in modern psychiatry, has confounded many psychiatrists from the 1960s. This paper attempts to understand the prevalence of neurasthenia among the lay public in post-World War II Hong Kong. It examines the social history of psychiatry and focuses on the roles of traditional Chinese medicine in shaping public perceptions and responses towards neurasthenia. This research reveals that, when psychiatrists discarded the term as an ineffective label in the 1950s, practitioners and pharmaceutical companies of Chinese medicine seized on the chance to reinvent themselves as experts in neurasthenia. By commericialising everyday distress, they provided affordable, accessible and culturally familiar healing options to the Chinese public. A case study of neurasthenia, therefore, is not simply about changing disease categories but an important example to illustrate the tensions between traditional medicine and Western psychiatry in Asia.

In traditional society, medical charity had strong moral and educational purposes. But this pursuit of morality faded away in modern times. As to the charity purpose, unlike the medical charity organizations that were eager to rebuild the morality and public ethics, instead, more and more interests were paid to utilitarian consideration and secular benefits. As to the social function of charity, \"diseases\" were no longer regarded as the extension of \"poverty\" , but the most direct index of rehabilitation. Medical activities became increasingly simple and developed towards professionalization, leading to the advent, to certain extent, of modern medical system. Medical charity, as a strategic approach for saving the nation and social reform, went beyond moral education, embodying national responsibility and political intention.
传统社会中，救济贫病、施医给药的善举有着浓重的道德教化色彩。近代以降，民间医疗慈善的道德诉求日渐式微。从施善目的来看，医疗慈善组织不再像传统社会追求重塑社会道德与公众价值伦理，而是有着更多的功利性考量和世俗利益诉求于其中；从施善社会功能来看，此时的\"病\"者，不再被视为\"贫\"的延伸，而是作为最直接的救助指标；医疗行为变得更为单纯，在实践上向着更专业化的方向发展，在一定程度上促进了近代医疗体系的诞生；医疗慈善超越单纯的道德教化，被视为救国策略和社会改造的重要途径，体现出强烈的国家责任与政治意图。.

This article surveys anglophone scholarship in the history of medicine over the past decade or so. It selectively identifies and critically evaluates key themes and trends in the field. It discusses the emergence of the discipline from a period of directional crisis to more recent emphasis on a pluralistic and \'bigger-picture\' agenda, on comparative, cross-disciplinary and multicultural approaches, and on the reorientation and (putative) broadening out of medical history towards wider public engagement and closer interface with medical humanities.

This essay recognizes that the interactions that define medical care are problematic and that narrative is invoked to overcome these strains. Being grounded in science, medicine, too, might be influenced by a particular world-view that arose in the natural philosophy of the Scientific Revolution. If narrative responds to this sort of medicine, it may retain traces of this mindset. A feminist approach responds to this viewpoint and may used beneficially to analyze both the story of medicine and the stories within medicine. Tensions discussed from this perspective are those between sickness and health and those between patient and provider; also questioned are suitable form(s) of narrative and whose narratives are valued. Suggestions for broadening narrative to address these issues include letting the body speak for itself, overcoming the power differential in the patient/provider interaction and using standpoints to foster a more equal and just medical system.