No One Was Turned Away: The Role of Public Hospitals in New York City Since 1900

by Sandra Opdycke

Overview

For more than a century, New York City's public hospitals have played a major role in ensuring that people of every class have had a place to turn for care. This comparison of the history of Bellevue Hospital with that of the private New York Hospital illuminates the unique contribution that public hospitals have made to the city and confirms their continued value today. Portraying the hospital as an urban institution that reflects the social, political, economic, demographic, and physical changes of the surrounding city, this book links the role of public hospitals to the ongoing debate about the place of public institutions in American society.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780198028086
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	02/29/2000
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Sandra Opdycke is Adjunct Visiting Professor in the Department of Urban Studies at Vassar College and Associate Director of the Institution in Social Policy at Fordham University.

Table of Contents

	Introduction	3
1	New Century, New Start: 1900-1910	17
2	Maintaining the Mission: 1910-1930	43
3	Help in Time of Trouble: 1930-1950	71
4	Many Voices, Many Claims: 1950-1965	99
5	The Limits of Reform: 1965-1970	131
6	Holding the Fort: After 1970	159
	Conclusion	193
	Notes	203
	Bibliography	225
	Index	237

What People are Saying About This

David J. Rothman

Sandra Opdycke's book combines urban history, social history, and the history of medicine in exemplary fashion. By comparing two notable hospitals, Bellevue and New York Hospital, she shows readers all that a public system could provide for its citizens.

Joel D. Howell

Public hospitals have long played an essential, integral role in American society. Visible, responsive to public pressures, and, above all, inclusive, these hospitals are perhaps nowhere so visible as in New York City. They are brilliantly portrayed in Sandra Opdycke's fascinating book, which will be of interest to historians and policy-makers alike.
— University of Michigan

Rosemary Stevens

This is a dramatic, impeccably researched, and well-told story of two important American hospitals, Bellevue and New York Hospital, as their sponsors negotiated the hospitals' roles through decades of change. Focusing on the two great traditions of urban hospital care represented in these institutions, one public and one private, this book is a major contribution to the history of American hospitals, urban history in general, and in particular to the social and political history of New York City.
— University of Pennsylvania

Kenneth T. Jackson

The 20th-century transformation of urban hospitals, from small-size and small-budget institutions to huge complexes with thousands of employees, multiple buildings, and billion-dollar budgets, is a story that few people have understood and that fewer still have studied. Comparing two world-famous medical centers--one public, one private -- Sandra Opdycke demonstrates with grace and elegance why a taxpayer-funded municipal system is the best way to meet the health care needs of the nation's neediest citizens.
— Columbia University, Editor-in-Chief of The Encyclopedia of New York City

Editorial Reviews

No One Was Turned Away should be required reading for urban officials, hospital administrators, and others struggling to provide care for the underserved.

Journal of the American Medical Association

"The twentieth-century transformation of urban hospitals, from small-size and small-budget institutions to huge complexes with thousands of employees, multiple buildings, and billion-dollar budgets, is a story that few people have understood and that fewer still have studied. Comparing two world-famous medical centers—one public, one private—Sandra Opdycke demonstrates with grace and elegance why a taxpayer-funded municipal system is the best way to meet the health care needs of the nation's neediest citizens."—Kenneth T. Jackson, Columbia University, Editor-in-Chief of The Encyclopedia of New York City

"Public hospitals have long played an essential, integral role in American society. Visible, responsive to public pressures, and, above all, inclusive, these hospitals are perhaps nowhere so visible as in New York City. They are brilliantly portrayed in Sandra Opdycke's fascinating book, which will be of interest to historians and policy-makers alike."—Joel D. Howell, University of Michigan

"Sandra Opdycke's book combines urban history, social history, and the history of medicine in exemplary fashion. By comparing two notable hospitals, Bellevue and New York Hospital, she shows readers all that a public system could provide for its citizens. At a time when public hospitals are under attack, her history offers critical guidelines for policy."—David J. Rothman, Columbia University

"This is a dramatic, impeccably researched, and well-told story of two important American hospitals, Bellevue and New York Hospital, as their sponsors negotiated the hospitals' roles through decades of change. Focusing on the two great traditions of urban hospital care represented in these institutions, one public and one private, this book is a major contribution to the history of American hospitals, urban history in general, and in particular to the social and political history of New York City."—Rosemary Stevens, University of Pennsylvania

"This book examines hospital development in New York City, and by doing so it serves as a microcosm for understanding hospital development nationwide."—The Unionist

"It would be hard to read this eloquently written, well-dicumented narrative in all its fascinating detail without recognising the importance of the roles that these hospitals have had in the development of New York City."—Lancet

From the Publisher