title: [The construction of a medical discipline and its challenges: Orthopedics in Switzerland during the 19th and 20th centuries].
abstract: During the 19th century, numerous figures, with different qualifications, claimed to practice orthopedics: doctors, surgeons, inventors of equipment and instruments, and other empiricists. They performed certain types of techniques, massages, surgical operationsand/or fitted prostheses. The polysemous notion of orthopedics had created conflicts of interest that would reach their height at the end of the 19th century. The integration of orthopedics into the training at the university level enhanced its proximity to surgery, a discipline that has dominated the so-called modern medicine. During the 20th century, various medical branches defend the legitimacy of certain orthopedic practices, thereby threating to a degree the title itself of this specialization. By examining the challenges that have shaped the history of orthopedics in Switzerland, this article also seeks to shed light on the strategies that were implemented in adopting a medical and technical discipline within a transforming society.
authors.affiliation: 1 Institut universitaire d'histoire de la médecine et de la santé publique, CHUV - Université de Lausanne.
authors.forename: Mariama
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kaba
mesh_terms: D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D009985:Orthopedics / Q000266:history*; D013557:Switzerland