Saving lives: A historical and ethnographic study of resuscitation techniques
type: CreativeWork
description: Resuscitation techniques are heralded as life-saving but they rarely fulfill this promise: the survival ratio for out-of-hospital resuscitative efforts rarely rises above 10 percent. I investigate this paradox of resuscitation technology by following the historical development of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and by analyzing how emergency personnel use the technique on a routine basis. The central question through my dissertation is: how does a resuscitation technique receive its shape and how does it shape in turn the world in which it is used?
abstract: Resuscitation techniques are heralded as life-saving but they rarely fulfill this promise: the survival ratio for out-of-hospital resuscitative efforts rarely rises above 10 percent. I investigate this paradox of resuscitation technology by following the historical development of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and by analyzing how emergency personnel use the technique on a routine basis. The central question through my dissertation is: how does a resuscitation technique receive its shape and how does it shape in turn the world in which it is used?
author: Timmermans, Stefan Maria
language: eng
keywords: Sociology, Theory and Methods, Health Sciences, Public Health, History of Science
date published: 2011-05-07T12:20:20Z
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:25:14Z
provider: University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/2142/19842