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medicine
medieval medicine
ideas on the cause of disease in medieval medicine
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Cards (22)
Miasma
Bad
stinking
air believed to cause
disease
The
Four Humours
Black bile
,
yellow bile
, blood and phlegm
The Four Humours
Black
bile
Yellow
bile
Blood
Phlegm
Hippocrates
Greek
doctor & teacher who created the theory of the
Four Humours
Four Humours theory
Body contains
four
humours
If healthy, humours are
balanced
If ill, humours are
imbalanced
Curing
illness
with
Four Humours
1. Identify
imbalanced humour
2. Remove excess of
imbalanced humour
(e.g. using
leeches
or cups)
Galen
Roman doctor who developed the
Four Humours
theory by creating the Theory of
Opposites
Theory of
Opposites
If you have too much of a humour, cure it with the
opposite
The
church
supported the idea of the Four Humours and all physicians were taught about it when educated by the
Church
Urine charts
Used by physicians to check
colour
,
smell
and taste to diagnose illness
Miasma
Belief that bad
stinking
air from dirt/waste
poisoned
the air and caused illness
King Edward I said "The
smoke
from the houses is infecting the air with contagious sickness" during the
Black Death
The idea of miasma was supported by
Hippocrates
and
Galen
, making it more widely accepted
Miasma
Thought to be sent from
God
or caused by the
planets
Diseases
Punishment from
God
for sins or a way of God testing your
faith
Leprosy
was commonly linked to
sin
The
1348-49
Black Death was thought to be a
punishment
for peoples' sins
Superstitions like
witchcraft
and astrology were common in the
Middle Ages
Astrology
Part of
medical
training, physicians used
planetary
movements to diagnose and treat disease
Physicians believed the
stars
and
planets
affected your health and caused disease, like the movement of Saturn and Jupiter causing the Black Death
Other causes of disease were
witchcraft
,
bad
luck
or
blaming
minority
groups
like
Jews
During the Middle Ages,
no
progress was made in understanding the causes of
disease