In Vitro Fertilization Comes to America: Memoir of a Medical Breakthrough

Jones Jr, Dr Howard W

ISBN 10: 0989719936 / ISBN 13: 9780989719933

Published by Jamestowne Bookworks, 2014

Item in good condition. Textbooks may not include supplemental items i.e. CDs, access codes etc. Seller Inventory # 00099054114

Synopsis:

This is the compelling story about the struggle to develop in vitro fertilization technology in America, told by the pioneer, Howard W. Jones, Jr. M.D. “This is an inspirational book from one of the giants of medicine in the last century,” Suheil Muasher, M.D., Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
It begins with the retirement of two internationally famous doctors, Howard Jones and his wife Georgeanna, after long careers at Johns Hopkins University. The day they arrived to make a new home in Norfolk, Virginia, the world woke up to an announcement that Robert Edwards and his colleague, Patrick Steptoe, had delivered the first baby conceived in a Petri dish (‘in vitro’) in a northern English city. When a local newspaper heard that the Joneses had worked with Edwards, a future Nobelist, the reporter asked if it could be done in America. It took a lot of toil with sparse resources to build a program against virulent resistance in that conservative corner of Virginia. Finally, success came in 1981 with the birth of Elizabeth Carr, making the United States the third country in the world with ‘test-tube’ babies. And now, millions of people owe their existence to IVF.
For the rest of his life to the age of 104, Howard promoted IVF for infertile people and published research and books, several after he turned a century. A charismatic doctor in his earlier career, he became an almost mythic figure in American medicine, deeply engaged in the latest advances and the social reactions to a controversial treatment, even defending the ethics of human embryology at the Vatican.
This book was edited and compiled by Roger Gosden, the last Howard and Georgeanna Jones professor of reproductive medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School. His wife, Lucinda Veeck, worked with the Joneses from the beginning as director of the embryology laboratory.

About the Author: Howard W. Jones, Jr., was born December 30, 1910 in Baltimore, Maryland. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree (cum laude) in 1931 from Amherst College and his M.D. in 1935 from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He was a surgeon and a member of staff in the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at Johns Hopkins until retirement at age 65. He held key positions in the development of ethical standards for assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs), and is a past chairman of the American Fertility Society (now A.S.R.M.) Ethics Committee on Reproductive Technology. He and his late wife, Dr. Georgeanna Jones, were the only American gynecologists invited by the Vatican to participate on a panel to advise Pope John Paul II concerning ARTs. A role early in his career in treating gynecological cancer was important in the development of the Pap smear and other technologies that have reduced the death rate from cervical cancer. One of his patients was Henrietta Lacks whose cancer cells proved to be immortal and are known as HeLa cells. While at Johns Hopkins he became involved in reconstructive surgery of the internal and external genitalia of individuals affected by disorders of sexual development. He was also involved with sex reassignment surgery in individuals suffering from transsexualism. Following retirement from Johns Hopkins in 1978, the Drs. Joneses moved to the Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk, Virginia, where they established the first in vitro fertilization (IVF) program in the United States. This challenge resulted in the birth of Elizabeth Jordan Carr, the first IVF baby in the Americas.

Bibliographic Details

Title: In Vitro Fertilization Comes to America: ...
Publisher: Jamestowne Bookworks
Publication Date: 2014
Binding: Soft cover
Condition: Good