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Natural History of Disease

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Abstract

In science, the term natural history embodies two concepts: first, the faithful and accurate description of the phenomena of nature; second, a description of the changes they undergo over a period of time. Ryle describes the work of the naturalist as “observing, recording, classifying, and analyzing.”1 Physicians have not always seen themselves as naturalists, nor have they always seen diseases as objects of nature.

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© 1983 Springer-Verlag New York Inc.

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Freer, C.B., McWhinney, I.R. (1983). Natural History of Disease. In: Taylor, R.B., Rosen, M.G., Jacott, W.E., Donatelle, E.P., Buckingham, J.L. (eds) Fundamentals of Family Medicine. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-5433-1_15

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-5433-1_15

  • Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY

  • Print ISBN: 978-0-387-90705-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4612-5433-1

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