Disease And Infection Flashcards
Egyptian - Supernatural beliefs?
3000-600bc
Believed pharaohs had special powers, gods on earth,
Imhotep gained god status for his abilities in medicine
Carried charms (scarab beetles)
Prehistoric Medicine?
Means before written records
Mainly supernatural beliefs (evil spirits)
Have been compared to aborigines who use trephining to release evil spirit
Also used magic charms and medicine men
Also had some natural treatments (herbal and broken bones put in clay)
Egyptian - Natural Beliefs?
3000-600bc
Developed writing, records survive (papyrus ebers)
Natural explanation based on Nile
Illness caused by blocked channels
Vomiting and purging to unblock channels.
Greek medicine - supernatural(Asclepion)
600-200bc
They had supernatural explanations as they visited asclepions.
They believed the god Asklepios would visit them with his daughters and a snake to heal them in their sleep.
Greek Medicine- Natural (Hippocrates)
600-200bc
He’s considered the father of modern medicine
He believed in natural causes
Started clinical observation and created the Hippocratic oath
His Theory that an imbalance of the four humours caused illness developed from Aristotle
Started the idea of preventive medicine, having a healthy lifestyle
Roman medicine - Galen
He studied at Alexandria
Developed 4 humours into theory of opposites
Remained the main form treatment throughout the Middle Ages as was acceptable to all religions
Impact of fall of the Roman Empire
Roman Empire collapsed
Western Europe entered regression
Many books and ideas were lost/destroyed
Islamic Medicine - Rhazes & Avicenna
R - found difference between small pox and measles
A - wrote Canon of Medicine (all medical knowledge to date)
Impact of superstition and Christianity on medieval medicine
Return to supernatural beliefs and treatments(prayer and flagellation)
Illness said to be punishment from god
Eg Leprosy and mental illness due to devil.
Natural methods in Middle Ages
Bleeding, wise women
Use of urine charts and interpretation of position of planets to explain illness
Still used theory of opposites and related treatment(blood letting, vomiting)
Wise women had knowledge of herbal treatments, helped those who were ill(poor) and we’re sometimes seen as witches.
Responses to plague
Prayer, flagellation Killed Jews who they thought poisoned the wells Avoided crowds Quarantine introduced first in Italy and then in other places Red crosses on doors Killed stray dogs Buried dead at night Bye laws.
Jenner - vaccinations
Noticed milkmaids with cow pox did not catch smallpox
Created small pox vaccination
Made compulsory in 1852
Pasteur
1860’s - used experiments and swan neck flask to prove germs caused disease and did not spontaneously generate because of disease
1880 - developed chicken cholera vaccine
1881 - anthrax vaccine
Koch
1870's - proved a particular germ causes a particular disease Factors were; War, (with France ~ see Pasteur) Individual genius Technology Government support
Ehrlich - magic bullets
1909 - found first chemical drug(magic bullet) called Salvarsan 606
Later sulphonamide drugs developed to kill microbe causing pneumonia