Cancer on Trial

In Cancer on Trial Peter Keating and Alberto Cambrosio explore how practitioners established a new style of practice, at the center of which lies the cancer clinical trial. Far from mere testing devices, these trials have become full-fledged experiments that have redefined the practices of clinicians, statisticians, and biologists. Keating and Cambrosio investigate these trials and how they have changed since the 1960s, all the while demonstrating their significant impact on the progression of oncology. A novel look at the institution of clinical cancer research and therapy, this book will be warmly welcomed by historians, sociologists, and anthropologists of science and medicine, as well as clinicians and researchers in the cancer field.

"This remarkable book charts the emergence of a clinical field--medical oncology--for which experimental protocols have become routinized as a form of normal practice. Cancer on Trial will make a lasting contribution to the sociology of scientific knowledge, the history of clinical practice, and the understanding of the networked basis of biomedical research."--Jeremy A. Greene, Harvard University, "Cancer on Trial is a landmark study in historical and social studies of clinical research. Keating and Cambrosio brilliantly analyze the apparatus through which oncology trials are conducted. Through detailed examinations of specific trials in three periods, they show how tightly coupled epistemic, institutional, and technical changes constituted a new form of clinical research practice. This carefully argued and meticulously documented book will be immensely interesting not only to scholars in science and technology studies, but also to cancer researchers interested in the origins of their experimental practices."--Stephen Hilgartner, Cornell University, "This innovative book is more than a history of cancer research and clinical trials in the twentieth century, it's a history of contemporary biomedicine all together. Whereas most previous scholarly accounts have placed the laboratory at center stage, Cancer on Trial finally gives the clinic the attention it deserves. Clinical trials might seem less glamorous than 'eureka moments' in the laboratory, but they are certainly more representative of the workings of today's biomedical research. By focusing on cancer clinical trials as a 'style of practice, ' rather than as the routine testing of new treatments, Keating and Cambrosio show compellingly how biomedicine has evolved into a specific kind of research enterprise redefining at the same time treatments, diseases, patients, and researchers. Cancer on Trial offers to its readers powerful intellectual tools to understand current debates about the successes and failures of cancer therapies, the role of public and private research, and the promises and perils of personalized medicine. Anyone interested in current biomedical research will benefit immensely from reading this book."--Bruno J. Strasser, University of Geneva and Yale University, "Cancer on Trial is a substantial contribution to our historical and sociological understanding of clinical cancer research and is highly recommended for anyone interested in the actual emergence of bioscience in clinical settings. This excellent book treats the meteoric rise of cancer research and treatment across the globe since the mid-twentieth century by focusing explicitly on transnational cooperative clinical trials as the hub through which oncology emerged as a new form of medical and scientific practice."--Stephen Pemberton "Metascience"

Peter Keating is professor of history at the Universite du Quebec a Montreal. Alberto Cambrosio is professor in the Department of Social Studies of Medicine at McGill University. Together, they are the authors of Exquisite Specificity and Biomedical Platforms.