Medicine through time

• War


  War has been an important factor in developing medicine throughout the last 1000 years. War was a constant feature of medieval life and this led to advances in surgery and the treatment of wounds.
• Medieval period wound treatment

  1. Cauterisation (applying great heat to stop bleeding)

  2. John Arderne developed pain killing ointment (anaesthetic) made from hemlock, opium and henbane

  3. Ambroise Pare developed technique for treating wounds using a simple cool salve (ointment) made from egg white, turpentine and rose water
• Infection was a major cause of death when a soldier had a wound
• World War One medical developments


  1. Death of over 8 million soldiers and more than 20 million injured

  2. Harold Gillies developed ground breaking techniques for treating facial injuries

  3. First ever blood depot set up

  4. British Red Cross set up first voluntary blood donor scheme

  5. X-rays used to locate bullets and shrapnel
• World War Two medical developments


  Sir Archibald McIndoe improved skin graft techniques to treat pilots with burns
• Plastic surgery is an important field of modern medicine
• Religion and superstition


  In the Middle Ages the Church dominated peoples understanding of the world, the afterlife and medicine. The Church encouraged people to believe that illness and disease were punishments sent by God.
• Role of the Church in medicine


  • Developed hospitals
  • Set up university schools of medicine
  • Limited progress by opposing human dissections and challenging Galen's teachings
• The Protestant Reformation weakened the power of religion in Europe
• Some religious groups opposed developments like anaesthetics and vaccines
• Role of government


  Until the middle of the 19th Century the government and authorities generally had a laissez-faire (let it be) attitude to public health and did not generally regard it as their role to protect public health.
• Government response to the Great Plague of 1665


  1. Mayor of London ordered actions like lighting fires and cleaning streets

  2. Infected people quarantined in their homes
• 19th Century government public health developments


  1. 1848 Public Health Act allowed towns to set up Boards of Health

  2. The Great Stink prompted Parliament to build London's sewage system
• Beveridge Report and the NHS


  • Suggested the creation of a welfare state which would look after people 'from cradle to the grave'
  • Led to the Labour Government introducing the National Health Service in 1948
• Science and Technology


  The Renaissance encouraged a more questioning and scientific approach to the study of medicine which led to improvements in technology.
• Role of individuals


  Significant individuals made important contributions to the development of medicine over time.
• Chance


  Chance has always played a role in the development of medicine, with some important discoveries being made by accident.
• Chance discoveries


  • Hugh of Lucca and Theodoric's use of wine-soaked bandages
  • Ambroise Pare's use of a simple cool salve
  • Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin
• Communication was important for the spread of medical knowledge and discoveries
• Surgeons such as Hugh of Lucca and his son Theodoric working in Italy in the Thirteenth Century started dressing wounds with bandages soaked in wine which was an antiseptic. They made this discovery by chance.
• John Arderne, an English surgeon working in London in the 14th Century, developed his own pain killing ointment (anaesthetic) made from hemlock, opium and henbane in 1376.
• In 1388 the government ordered town authorities to keep the streets free from waste. Towns introduced public health measures to tackle waste, sewage and pollution.
• In 1421 the Mayor's Proclamation required every man to clean the street in front of his house every Saturday.
• In 1420 the council gave William Otley the right to collect one penny from every resident or shop every 3 months for his weekly street cleaning services.
• The council also designated specific out of town sites for waste disposal.
• In total Coventry's council banned waste disposal in the River.
• Islamic doctors preserved Greek teachings on medicine and added to it, which was then communicated to Europe via translated texts during the middle ages or from knights being treated by Islamic doctors during the crusades.
• The new art of printing developed in 1454 by Johann Gutenberg made it easier for new ideas to spread throughout Europe. Medical books could be made more cheaply and in greater quantity which helped new medical ideas spread more quickly.
• By 1525 Galen's books on anatomy were published in Greek and translated into Latin. Until then doctors had relied on copies translated centuries before, first into Arabic and then into Latin. Now they could read the original they were impressed with Galen's descriptions. They took seriously his recommendations that they should study the human body for themselves.
• The authorities introduced more measures to protect London in the Great Plague of 1665 than the Black Death in 1348. Town and Parish Councils tried to prevent the spread of the disease.
• The College of Physicians was founded in 1518 under Henry VIII. This was an important step in training, regulating and licensing doctors.
• Andreas Vesalius was born in 1514 in Brussels and became a medical professor at Padua University in Italy. He believed that successful surgery was only possible if doctors had a proper understanding of anatomy (the human body).
• Vesalius was able to perform dissections on criminals who had been executed. This allowed him to study the human body closely.
• He wrote books based on his observations using accurate diagrams to illustrate his work. The most important were 'Six Anatomical Pictures' 1538 and 'The Fabric of the Human Body' 1543.
• William Harvey was a British doctor born in 1578. He studied medicine at Padua University in Italy. He then went on to work in London at Royal College of Physicians before becoming Royal Physician to James I and Charles I.
• Harvey studied animals and humans for his work. He realised he could observe living animal hearts in action and that his findings could then be applied to humans.
• Before Harvey, people thought there was two kinds of blood and they flowed through two completely separate systems of blood vessels. This idea came from Galen.
• Harvey realised Galen was wrong. From experiments he realised too much blood was being pumped out of the heart for it to be being continually formed fresh and then used up. Instead he realised that it must being circulated – going round and round the human body.
• Vesalius


  Produced notebooks based on his observations using accurate diagrams to illustrate his work. The most important were 'Six Anatomical Pictures' 1538 and 'The Fabric of the Human Body' 1543
• Before Vesalius some doctors argued that drawings had no place in Science