c.1500-c.1700 - The Medical Renaissance

• • ME: VESALIUS - medical professor in Padua, successful surgery could only be done if anatomy was properly understood, performed dissection on executed criminals, described his observations in illustrated books (e.g. six anatomical pictures - 1583 + the fabric of the human body-1543), encouraged others to discover more by questioning and dissecting, important first step
• • ME: THOMAS SYDENHAM - thought it was important to have practical experience, detailed records of patients symptoms, believed disease could be classified, different types of disease could be found by observing patients symptoms, introduced laudanum for pain, iron for anaemia, quinine for malaria and differentiate measles and scarlet fever, wrote ‘medical observations’ (1676) a medical textbook used for 200 years, medical descriptions like gout to help doctors diagnose patients, made diagnosis more important part of a doctors work whereas before it was prognosis
• • ME:WILLIAM HARVEY- studied living animal hearts it related to humans, found blood was being produced from the heart and circulated the body, gave doctors a new map of how the body worked (blood transfusion and complex would not have been able), blood letting continued even the he proved it a wrong, proved old ideas wrong (purple ‘nutrition’ blood’ was produced in the liver, flowed through the veins to the rest of the body where consumed; bright red ‘life giving blood’ was produced in the lungs and flowed through arteries to the body where consumed (theories influence by Galen))
• • RE: BEGINNING - protestant christianity spread during the reformation reducing the influence of the catholic church, less control over medical teaching
• • RE: BEGINNING - rediscovered of greek and roman knowledge, greater interest in 4 humours and opposite theory
• • RE: BEGINNING - emergence of science, direct observation of the body and experimentation
• • RE: BEGINNING - new writings discovered showed importance of understanding anatomy through dissection
• • RE: IMPROVEMENT OF MEDICAL KNOWLEDGE - new weapons (guns and canons) invented so doctors needed quick new ways to treat new injuries 
• RE: IMPROVEMENT OF MEDICAL KNOWLEDGE - exploration of the new world brought new ingredients and thus more medicine, guaiacum believed to cure syphilis, quinine drug for malaria from cinchona tree bark
• • RE: IMPROVEMENT OF MEDICAL KNOWLEDGE - closure of monasteries by Henry VIII closed most hospitals as they were run by monasteries and monks, replaced with free hospitals (paid for by donations), run by physicians and were more focused on treatments instead of monastic hospitals which focused on refuge mainly
• • RE: TRANSMISSION OF IDEAS - printing press first set up in Britain in 1740s , accelerated the rate of progress in medicine 
• • RE: TRANSMISSION OF IDEAS - before the printing press a single copy of a book would take months to make, ideas in books would have to be widely accepted before anyone bothered copying them, printing press allowed books to be copied efficiently,
• • RE: TRANSMISSION OF IDEAS - new textbooks, new ideas spread and debated in many different languages, most people couldn't read so mediaeval ideas were still largely practised, at least 600 copies of galen’s ideas were printed between 1753-1599 but so many different versions made his original ideas less clear and less reliable
• • RE: TRANSMISSION OF IDEAS - royal society - prestigious scientific body supported by King Charles II and founded in 1660, got people to trust new technologies, encouraged people to question scientific ideas with motto ‘Nullius in verba’ meaning take no-one's word for it, scientific journal ‘Philosophical transactions’ allowed more people to read about new stuff
• • RE: MEDICAL TREATMENT CONTINUITY - bloodletting and purging, education of doctors mainly reading books and no practical dissection, apothecaries and barber surgeons still chosen over physicians, supernatural treatments still widely believed in (kin’s touch cured scrofula), wise women still trusted in making herbal remedies, personal family remedies still passed down, no-one with infectious or incurable diseases allowed in hospitals
• • RE: THE GREAT PLAGUE 1665 - recurrence of the mediaeval black death, killed 20% of London’s population
• • RE: THE GREAT PLAGUE 1665 - treatments - included wearing lucky charms or amulets, praying and fasting, special remedies using ingredients like dried toad, bloodletting, herbs and flowers to stop miasma, strapping live chickens to bubos to transfer illness from victim to chicken
• • RE: THE GREAT PLAGUE 1665 - prevention - victims locked in their houses and red cross painted on their doors with ‘LORD HAVE MERCY UPON US’ written, crowded areas closed, avoided physical contact (coins given in a shop were placed in a jar of vinegar), dead bodies of victims buried far away in mass graves collected by carts, cats and dogs killed as they believed to be carriers of the disease