Abstract
To some extent this little book is the outcome of a conference of the London teachers of physiology. They have for long felt that a revision of their practical courses was necessary, and the present work, which is issued under the ægis of Prof. Starling, indicates the kind of reform considered desirable. One understands that in the future the practical examinations in the University of London, at any rate, will be largely modelled on the kind of course here presented. The main underlying new idea is that medical students should be taught physiology so as to fit them for being, not expert pure physiologists, but medical men with a knowledge of those portions of the vast subject which will be immediately useful to them in their study and treatment of diseased conditions. The frog is therefore relegated to a position of subsidiary importance, and as many experiments as possible are given in which the mammal, and especially man himself, is the corpus vile. It would be ungracious at this stage to point out faults of omission and commission of which the authors, Drs. Alcock and Ellison, have been guilty in their praise worthy attempt to carry out the new idea. It will only be possible to do so when the book has been tried as a practical guide, and future editions will no doubt, show various improvements, after the present one has been subjected to this test.
A Text-book of Experimental Physiology for Students of Medicine.
By Dr. N. H. Alcock Dr. F. O'B. Ellison. With a preface by Prof. E. H. Starling, F.R.S. Pp. xii + 139. (London: J. and A. Churchill, 1909.) Price 5s. net.
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H., W. A Text-book of Experimental Physiology for Students of Medicine . Nature 82, 97 (1909). https://doi.org/10.1038/082097c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/082097c0