Medicalrhetoric.org is for anyone interested in medical rhetoric, for people who want to read, and for those who want to contribute. As this is a new website, we are actively soliciting information, and what the site becomes will be shaped both by contributions and by feedback on what people would like to see. Please contact the site moderator with any suggestions. Although there is an overlap between medical rhetoric and medical writing, just as there is an overlap between all rhetoric and other forms of writing, the focus of this website is on the rhetoric of how we talk about medical care.
Health care is a vast industry in the United States, too large some say, in terms of how much we spend on it. The qualitative nature of health care is also expanding. There is increasing interest in complementary and alternative medicine, and in traditional forms of medical care outside of western medicine, such as acupuncture. There is also intensive research on new drugs and on medical treatment involving such dumbfounding ideas as altering the DNA of the patient. In addition to the increasing variety of medical treatments, the modern Medical Industrial Complex involves sums of money too large to count, ethical questions that provoke heated passions, and political issues reaching the level of presidential politics.
Discussions of health care and medicine are too important for us not to pay attention, and along with politicians, journalists, preachers, and sociologists, the analyses of rhetorical scholars can-we hope-be useful voices in this discourse. There is a growing interest in medical rhetoric, and with this website we are saying that we think that interest should grow still further.