title: Medical instruments in museums: immediate impressions and historical meanings.
abstract: This essay proposes that our understanding of medical instruments might benefit from adding a more forthright concern with their immediate presence to the current historical focus on simply decoding their meanings and context. This approach is applied to the intriguingly tricky question of what actually is meant by a "medical instrument." It is suggested that a pragmatic part of the answer might lie simply in reconsidering the holdings of medical museums, where the significance of the physical actuality of instruments comes readily to hand.
authors.affiliation: Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Road, London NW 1 2BE, United Kingdom. ken.arnold@wellcome.ac.uk
authors.forename: Ken
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Arnold
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Söderqvist
mesh_terms: D005085:Exhibitions as Topic; D006801:Humans; D009144:Museums; D013525:Surgical Instruments; D006113:United Kingdom