Patterns of organization in the development of medical know-how: the case of glaucoma research

Abstract

This paper focuses on the longitudinal development of the glaucoma medical specialty with a view to capture the configurations of division of labor that contributed to or followed from novel understanding of the disease. The historical background is corroborated by an analysis of collaborative scholarly research over the period 1973- 2003 to illustrate how successive clinical and scientific modalities co-existed and influenced each other.