Medicine- Middle Ages

Question 1

What are the dates of Medieval Britain?

Answer 1

1250-1500.

Question 2

Date of the Black Death?

Answer 2

1348-1349.

Question 3

What was the official religion during Medieval Britain?

Answer 3

Roman Catholic .

Question 4

What controlled a lot of things during the middle ages, eg: education and medical training/ideas?

Answer 4

The Roman Catholic Church.

Question 5

Why were Galen’s ideas still believed during this time?

Answer 5

• The church was in charge of medical training, and as Galen’s ideas supported the ideas of the Church, they continued to spread and support his ideas.
• Galen’s work was the only work available.

Question 6

Beliefs on cause of illness:

Answer 6

-Church believed illness came from God because of sin- They would pray for a cure.

Question 7

Had public health improved or gotten worse since Ancient Rome?

Answer 7

Towns lacked the public health schemes of the Romans. Streets likely to have been filthy. Rats, mice and fleas. Garbage and human waste in streets.

Question 8

How was waste disposed of?

Answer 8

While the Romans used sewers to carry waste away , during medieval times waste was disposed of in the streets. No sewers, or water pipes.

Question 9

What was The Black Death?

Answer 9

A plague (1348-49). Spread by fleas on rats that arrived on ships coming from areas that were affected by the plague.
-Estimated to have killed around 50% of Europe's population.

Question 10

What were symptoms of The Black Death?

Answer 10

• Exhaustion
• High temperature
• Difficulty breathing
• Buboes (swellings filled with black pus)
• Sickness
• Spasms
• Bleeding under the skin.

Question 11

What did people during this time believe caused The Black Death?

Answer 11

• Miasma (Bad smells)
• Punishment from God
• The Four Humours (unbalanced)
• Poisoned water (blamed Jews)
• Brightly coloured clothing.

Question 12

How did people try and cure/prevent The Black Death?

Answer 12

• Carried sweet smelling herbs
• Lit fires (smoke thought to clear the air of disease)
• Praying
• Flagellants (to appease God and show they were sorry)
• Carry charms
• Theory of Opposites: blood letting, purging,vomiting, leeches.
• Home remedies, natural healing herbs.
• The kings touch.

Question 13

Public health (positives) :

Answer 13

• People encouraged to stretch limbs, wash their faces, clean their teeth, exercise, etc.
• Realised importance of good diet.
• Towns had bath houses
• Realised rooms next to privy’s were unhealthy, and towns paid people to clear cesspits.
• Medieval kings passed laws requiring people to keep the streets clean.

Question 14

What did monasteries do to improve public health?

Answer 14

Monasteries developed comprehensive systems of public health, including fresh running water, wash room, latrines with running sewers, clean towels and a compulsory bath four times a year.

Question 15

What was done to stop people with diseases spreading them?

Answer 15

• Many towns developed quarantine laws, and boarded up the houses of infected people. Red crosses painted on infected doors.
• People with leprosy were confined to lazar houses, a place for people with infectious diseases.
• People with leprosy made to carry bells so people knew they were infected.

Question 16

How did they treat the bodies of plague victims?

Answer 16

They realised that dead bodies could spread the plague, and so buried bodies in pits (six feet under).

Question 17

What would be the role of a Barber Surgeon?

Answer 17

They would perform surgery on wounded soldiers, and try and cure the diseased: blood letting, selling medicines, surgery. (And cutting hair).

Question 18

What is cauterisation?

Answer 18

This was where a physician identified that a certain part of your body was ill and it was cured by having red hot pokers put on it.

Question 19

What did monks do during this time?

Answer 19

Ran hospitals, provided care to other monks mainly and sometimes village people.

Question 20

What was a leper house?

Answer 20

Houses that kept people with leprosy away from other healthy people.

Question 21

How did the church affect medical advancement?

Answer 21

• They did not allow dissection
• Questioning of authority was not allowed and new ideas/theories were not accepted
• People were told to follow the works of Galen and no-one else; his ideas held errors which went unchallenged.
• They encouraged prayer and superstition- it was said that the gods and saints caused illness and disease for sinning.

Question 22

What was the moment common treatment used by doctors?

Answer 22

Blood letting, because of their beliefs in the four humours.

Question 23

What advances were there toward the end of the middle ages?

Answer 23

Advances in simple/external surgery due to wars. Uses of antiseptics (wine) and anaesthetics (opium).

Question 24

What stimulated Medieval developments in surgery?

Answer 24

War - the need to treat wounded soldiers.

Question 25

Who would surgery be left to during this time?

Answer 25

Surgery was left to barber surgeons, (not trained doctors).

Question 26

How were wise women trained to cure disease?

Answer 26

Knowledge would be passed down through female relatives.

Question 27

What are some examples of how a wise women would treat illness?

Answer 27

• Leeches (blood letting)
• Eels (believed they made warts disappear)
• Worms (for a sore throat, would be tied round neck)
• Nettles.

Question 28

What are some differences in middle ages public health from roman public health?

Answer 28

• Toilets only in London
• No piped water- contaminated water taken from streams.
• Only few bath houses
• Waste left on streets (until rakers employed to remove waste, and fines issued for littering).

Question 29

Treatment for black death:

Answer 29

• Prayer
• Bloodletting
• Herbal remedies
• Strapping toads, pigeons, and chickens to the buboes.

Question 30

Prevention of black death:

Answer 30

• Prayer
• Burying the dead
• Flagellation (whipping)
• Carrying charms
• Isolation
• Burning barrels of tar
• Smelling even worse smells.