author

S. P. Sackett

A late-19th-century physician and medical writer, this author is remembered for turning years of practical experience into plainspoken guidance for mothers and nurses. His best-known book reflects a time when home nursing and childbirth care often depended on everyday women as much as doctors.

1 Audiobook

Mother, Nurse and Infant A Manual Especially Adapted for the Guidance of Mothers and Monthly Nurses, Comprising Full Instruction in Regard To Pregnancy, Preparation for Child-birth, and the Care of Mother and Child, and Designed to Impart so Much Knowledge of Anatomy, Physiology, Midwifery, and the Proper Use of Medicines as Will Serve Intelligently to Direct the Wife, Mother and Nurse in All Emergencies.

Mother, Nurse and Infant A Manual Especially Adapted for the Guidance of Mothers and Monthly Nurses, Comprising Full Instruction in Regard To Pregnancy, Preparation for Child-birth, and the Care of Mother and Child, and Designed to Impart so Much Knowledge of Anatomy, Physiology, Midwifery, and the Proper Use of Medicines as Will Serve Intelligently to Direct the Wife, Mother and Nurse in All Emergencies.

by S. P. Sackett

About the author

S. P. Sackett was a physician as well as a writer on maternal and infant care. The surviving record available here is quite limited, but his best-known work is Mother, Nurse and Infant, first published in 1889.

In that book, Sackett explains that he wrote from long medical practice in "a small city and its vicinity," and says he had spent forty-five years in medicine. The manual was designed to give practical instruction on pregnancy, childbirth, midwifery, medicines, and the care of both mother and child, especially for mothers and monthly nurses who might need to act in emergencies.

Only one work by S. P. Sackett is clearly confirmed in the sources I found, so many personal details about his life remain uncertain. Even so, his writing stands out as an effort to make medical knowledge more accessible to non-specialist caregivers in the late 1800s.