Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness Book Prize

The Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness (FSHI) Book Prize of £1,000 is awarded annually each September to the author(s) or editor(s) of the book making the most significant contribution to medical sociology/sociology of health and illness and having been published over the three years preceding 1st January of the year in which the award is made (i.e. January 2023 to December 2025).

2026 Nominations

The Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness (FSHI) Book Prize is now accepting nominations for the 2026 award. Please consult the FSHI Book Prize Rules before making nominations. Nominations must be submitted using the FSHI Nomination Form. Nominations and three physical copies of the nominated books (and a PDF where possible) must be received in the BSA Office by Friday, 27 March 2026.

2025 Winner

The winner of the 2025 FSHI Book Prize is:

Previous Winners

• 2024 Winners: Understanding Baby Loss: The sociology of life, death and post-mortem Professor Kate Reed, Julie Ellis and Elspeth Whitby
• 2023 Winner: Reconsidering Patient Centred Care: Between Autonomy and Abandonment Alison Pilnick (Emerald Publishing Limited, 2022)
• 2022 Winner:  More Than Medicine: Nurse Practitioners and the Problems They Solve for Patients, Health Care Organizations, and the State LaTonya J. Trotter (Cornell University Press, 2020)
• 2021 Winner: Traveling with Sugar: Chronicles of a Global Epidemic Amy Moran-Thomas (University of California Press, 2019)
• 2020 Winner: Beautyscapes: Mapping Cosmetic Surgery Tourism Ruth Holliday, Meredith Jones and David Bell (Manchester University Press, 2017)
• 2019 Winner:  Infectious Change: Reinventing Chinese Public Health After an Epidemic Katherine A Mason (Stanford University Press, 2016)
• 2018 Winner:  Self-Injury, Medicine and Society: Authentic Bodies Amy Chandler (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016)
• 2017 Winner:  CyberGenetics: Health Genetics and New Media Anna Harris, Sarah Kelly and Sally Wyatt (Routledge, 2016)
• 2016 Winner:  addicted.pregnant.poor Kelly Ray Night (Duke University Press, 2015) 
• 2015 Winner:  Conceiving Masculinity: Male Infertility, Medicine and Identity Liberty Walther Barnes (Temple University Press, 2014)
• 2014 Winner:  The Gene, the Clinic and the Family: Diagnosing Dysmorphology, Reviving Medical Dominance Joanna Latimer (Routledge 2013).
• 2013 Winner:  Making the Mexican Diabetic: Race, Science and the Genetics of Inequality Michael J Montoya. (University of California Press, 2011).
• 2012 Winner:  Telecare Technologies and the Transformation of Healthcare Nelly Oudshoorn. (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).
• 2011 Winner:  The Professional Guinea Pig:  Big Pharma and the Risky World of Human Subjects Roberto Abadie (Duke University Press, 2010).
• 2010 Winner:  HIV Interventions: Biomedicine and the Traffic Between Information and Flesh.  Dr Marsha Rosengarten.  (University of Washington Press, 2009).
• 2009 Winner:  Uncertainty in Medical Innovation - Experienced Pioneers in Neonatal Care Jessica Mesman.  (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008).
• 2008 Winner:  HIV in South Africa.  Corinne Squire. (Routledge, Taylor & Francis, 2007).
• 2007 Winner:  Postmorten. How Medical Examiners Explain Suspicious Deaths Stefan Timmermans (The University of Chicago Press, 2006).
• 2006 Winner:  Suffering: A Sociological Introduction Iain Wilkinson.  (Policy, 2005).
• 2005 Winner:  The Politics of Personalised Medicine: Pharmacogenetics in the Clinic. Adam Hedgecoe.  (Cambridge University Press, 2004).
• 2004 Winner:  The Body Multiple: Ontology in Medical Practice Annemarie Mol.  (Duke University Press, Durham NC and London).
• 2003 Winner:  Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago Eric Klinenberg.  (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002).
• 2002 Winner:  Twice Dead. Organ Transplants and the Reinvention of Death Margaret Lock.  (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002).