Oral history interview with Fred Rickles, 1990.

Scope and Contents

Early work on laboratory projects related to hemophilia or other aspects of blood clotting while in high school and medical school; training in internal medicine and hematology and affiliation with Mary Gooley Hemophilia Center; involvement in initiating first hemophilia treatment center at University of Connecticut; early involvement in NHF; brief history of the search for the cause and a cure for hemophilia in 1950s through 1970s; early work in a comprehensive care model and aspects of the multi-disciplinary team; involvement in experiments with home care of hemophilia; aspects of the hemophilia "community"; perceived change in time in physicians’ relationships with people with hemophilia; anger towards physicians and other staff among patients with hemophilia and HIV; aspects of denial in response to advent of AIDS in hemophilia community; questions of what to communicate to patients during the early years of AIDS; development of heat treated and purified blood products such as monoclonal and recombinant blood factors; involvement of market forces as driving forces behind such research and development; current work on gene therapy as a treatment for hemophilia; perception of two different constituencies in hemophilia community - one HIV positive and one HIV negative - and their different needs; role of NHF regarding research

Subjects

• AIDS (Disease)--United States--History.
• Gene therapy.
• Hemophilia--Political aspects.
• Hemophilia--Social aspects.
• Hemophilia--United States--History.
• Interviews.
• National Hemophilia Foundation.
• Oral histories (document genres)
• Physicians--Interviews.
• Rickles, Frederick R.--Interviews.

Access Conditions

Copyright by the Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York, 2016