Since the appearance of Waitzkin's The Second Sickness, a landmark book
of the 1980s, American medicine has been dramatically transformed.
Waitzkin's earlier edition used qualitative research to take readers
inside the "black box" of medical decisionmaking. This new, fully
updated and expanded edition retains the earlier edition's vivid
approach and adds timely analysis of how managed care and other economic
and social forces influence medical practice today.