Product Description

Public health has made our lives safer--but it often works behind the scenes, without our knowledge, that is, "while we are sleeping." This book powerfully illuminates how public health works with more than sixty success stories drawn from the area of injury and violence prevention. It also profiles dozens of individuals who have made important contributions to safety and health in a range of social arenas. Highlighting examples from the United States as well as from other countries, While We Were Sleeping will inform a wide audience of readers about what public health actually does and at the same time inspire a new generation to make the world a safer place.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #594232 in Books
• Published on: 2009-05-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 248 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780520258464
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Review
"Faculty teaching courses in injury prevention will find this a useful addition to their syllabi. . . . It also may help inspire the next generation of researchers and practitioners."--Injury Prevention

From the Inside Flap
"While We Were Sleeping brings the stories of injury prevention alive. The stories link research to successful advocacy for change and highlight the need to translate data--to put a face on it--in order to make change. These are stories of creativity, courage, and commitment."--Linda C. Degutis, DrPH, MSN, Yale University

"'While we were sleeping,' things were happening--good things!--that most of us were not aware of. Injuries of almost all kinds, to children, teenagers, elderly, disabled, and ordinary folks were being drastically reduced. David Hemenway documents this progress, some of it in the nineteenth century, most of it in our lifetimes, with analysis of what brought it about and, in some cases, who the heroes were. It's exhilarating to read--instructive and exhaustively documented by an author who has devoted a career to this kind of analysis." --Thomas C. Schelling, 2005 Nobel Laureate in Economics, Harvard University

"I wish I had written this book. It is astute, inspiring, full of fascinating ideas, and it shows precisely how success in public health is achieved. David Hemenway has given us a story of heroic grit and remarkable achievement--indeed, a whole compendium of reasons for optimism about what people and society can do."--Atul Gawande, author of Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance

About the Author
David Hemenway is Professor of Health Policy at the Harvard School of Public Health, Director of the Harvard Injury Control Research Center, and Director of the Harvard Youth Violence Prevention Center. His previous books include Private Guns, Public Health.

Customer Reviews

A superb, instructive and uplifting book
This book is an excellent read for anyone who is searching for reasons to believe that public health activism can make a meaningful difference in our world. It is well-written, carefully researched, and has an intimate, accessible tone. I am going to recommend this book to all of my public health students and to my colleagues. I can easily imagine that I will be drawing information from it and referring to it time and time again for my own work. This is a much-needed contribution from an academic perspective, but also simply a fun read.

Should be required reading
This book should be required reading for all professionals in the injury and violence prevention field. The book provides a historical background as to what worked and who was involved. It is very well researched, well written, and very readable. While it does not provide a comprehensive historical coverage of the field, it is the only one existing. It provides some of the "best practices" for injury and violence interventions but is not comprehensive enough to offer a lot of options, solutions, or interventions for an injury or violence problem, nor does the book cover every one of the many injury and violence problems. Do not be deceived by the title--it is not a novel--the subtitle tells what the book is about. Injury Prevention: Competencies for Unintentional Injury Prevention Professionals

Inspirational Stories
David Hemenway has taken a subject--injury prevention--that is
difficult to comprehend for most people and made it not only real, but
human. These inspirational stories will not only give comfort and pride
to those of us who practice this vocation for a living, but they will,
indeed they should, serve as a primer for all thinking men and women
about how their actions can make a difference, and that injury
prevention is a noble calling worthy of our respect.

--Written by Lewis C. Howe, Injury Prevention Coordinator, Massachusetts Dept. of Public Health