"== Subtitle as epigraph == 

 The information in the articles collected in this volume may be seen as a memorial to the 19c. philanthropist Johns Hopkins (d. 1873, Baltimore, MD) and the medical work resulting, down to to the present day, from his foresight and posthumous munificence, and to the lifetime work of the physician Arnold  S. Relman (d. 2014, Cambridge, MA), a professor of social medicine and editor of The Journal of Clinical Investigation (1962-1967) and of The New England Journal of Medicine (1977-1991), who wrote extensively on medical publishing and reform of the U.S. health care system. 
 :   

 == How the contents of this volume is arranged == 

 Given that ""One common feature of all definitions of alternative medicine is its designation as other than conventional medicine"" (as the lead article mentions), this has influenced both the presentation of the information in the lead article and, in consequence, the selection of the other articles with their further information, much of which describes or reports about the development of conventional medicine, and what distinguishes that from ""alternative"".   

 This is encapsulated in the opening words of the lead article: ""Alternative medicine is any practice that is put forward as having the healing effects of medicine but is not based on evidence gathered using the scientific method"". The wording expresses a principal distinguishing feature between ""alternative"" medicine and 20c. mainstream medicine, which is more fully explained in the Background ""Definitions and terminology"" and ""History"" sections of the article. Practises such as homeopathy, naturopathy, chiropractic, and acupuncture are based on theories or principles which are intentionally and professedly other than that of mainstream ""scientific medicine"". 

 The unity and mutual relevance of the articles made here into a single volume is shown by the headings under which they are grouped. All but the lead article are linked from it, with few if any exceptions.  
 * The first group, headed  ""1 Main topic articles"", comprises two that expand at some length on the history of medicine and of alternative medicine, and two expanding on the regulation of homeopathy and of other forms of alternative medicine. 
 * The second group, ""2 Links from captions"", lists alphabetically the articles linked from the inset images of the version of the lead article as at .  Some but not all of them are also linked in the text. 
 * After the third group for other articles linked from the text (but not from the captions of the version of the lead article as at ) are two subgroups, one of ""3.2 Physicians in USA cited (1998-2013) about 'alternative medicine' "" (not linked from the captions) and one for other ""3.1 Persons"" (not linked from the captions). 
 * Finally, the article headed ""List of forms of alternative medicine"" is included  as an appendix. 

 Most of the images in the lead article of the version as at  recur in another of the articles, but, in the lead article, the captions and links were adapted to that context. 

    

 The opportunity for creating a book arranged in that way resulted from the introduction of images in a series of revisions to the lead article in July 2014, from to, in connection with a discussion of a proposal on the article's Talk page.      

 The images mentioned above included: 

  
 File:Queen Victoria Prince Albert and their nine children.JPG|alt=Photograph of a seated Victoria, dressed in black, holding an infant with her children and Prince Albert standing around her|Most hospitals in the countries of Europe and in the Americas, including those founded in 19c. such as Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children, founded in 1852 with Queen Victoria as patron, provide mainstream medicine. So