Evolutionary Medicine

Evolutionary thinking provides insights into many different areas in the research and practice of medicine and public health. It takes specialties such as medical microbiology, epidemiology, oncology, gynecology, and psychiatry that had become increasingly siloed and places them in a larger framework. This foundational structure enables students to view medical knowledge as an integrated whole, underpinned by general principles rather than a loose collection of disparate facts. The discipline of evolutionary medicine continues to advance rapidly as new results come in showing where the insights pay off and where they do not. Its conceptual foundations have also been strengthened in papers not yet reflected in the textbooks, so a new edition is therefore timely. At the same time, the teaching of evolutionary medicine has also been steadily gaining momentum both in courses that prepare undergraduates for medical school in North America and in other contexts worldwide. Evolutionary Medici