Medicine Through Time- renaissance medicine

Question 1

From what period did the renaissance last?

Answer 1

The 14th century to the 17th century

Question 2

Why was there an improvement in knowledge during the renaissance period?

Answer 2

Governments - such as that of Henry VIII - were strong and rich. The economy boomed and trade prospered. People could afford doctors.
Artists (such as Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Titian) revolutionised painting - this led them to study the body in more detail, and was connected to improved knowledge of anatomy
There was a revival of learning. Universities established schools of medicine. The Renaissance saw the beginning of scientific method - which involved conducting an experiment, collecting observations, then coming to a conclusion. At first, scholars merely claimed that they were renewing the perfection it had amongst the ancient teachers’, but soon they began to conduct experiments which led them to question the knowledge of the Greeks and Romans.
The invention of the printing press allowed new ideas to spread more quickly around Europe.
The discovery of America by Columbus meant that new foods and medicines were brought back from the New World.
The invention of new weapons (especially gunpowder) led to soldiers getting different sorts of wounds, which battlefield doctors had to deal with.

Question 3

Why were doctors not able to use their discoveries to produce suitable cures?

Answer 3

many people rejected the new ideas.

Also they had still not discovered the role that germs play in causing disease.

Question 4

Who was Vesalius?

Answer 4

He trained at Louvain, Paris and Padua universities, and ransacked cemeteries and gibbets for bones and for bodies to dissect.

Question 5

What did Vesalius discover in 1536?

Answer 5

He discovered the spermatic vessels. He also realised that the famous doctor Galen could be wrong, when he discovered that Galen was mistaken about there being two bones in the jaw, and about how muscles were attached to the bone.

Question 6

What did Vesalius do in 1537?

Answer 6

He became professor of medicine at Padua University. He said that medical students should perform dissections for themselves, stating that:”“… our true book of the human body is man himself.””

Question 7

What did Vesalius do in 1543?

Answer 7

He published ‘Fabric of the Human Body’ (with high-quality annotated illustrations).

Question 8

Who was William Harvey?

Answer 8

discovered the principle of the circulation of the blood through the body. He trained at Cambridge and Padua universities, and became doctor to James I and Charles I of England.

Question 9

What did William Harvey discover in 1616?

Answer 9

He calculated that it was impossible for the blood to be burned up in the muscles (as Galen had claimed).

Question 10

What did William Harvey do in 1628?

Answer 10

He published ‘Anatomical Account of the Motion of the Heart and Blood’, which scientifically proved the principle of the circulation of the blood. This book marked the end of Galen’s influence on anatomy.

Question 11

Why did doctors not advance in curing illness despite an increase in knowledge?

Answer 11

Paracelsus declared ““Galen is a liar and a fake”” but still believed in the four humours. He believed in alchemy, and believed it was possible to find the elixir of everlasting life.
Thomas Sydenham insisted that doctors should visit the sick, rather than the other way round, which showed some progress in his thinking - but he taught that disease was caused by ‘atmospheres’.
Nicholas Culpeper believed that illness was caused by the stars.
Anton van Leeuwenhoek discovered bacteria in 1683, using a single-lens microscope, but no one realised their significance, or that they caused disease.

Question 12

What was syphilis and what did people think it was caused by?

Answer 12

a terrible sexually transmitted disease which became prevalent at the time - was thought variously to be a punishment from heaven, or caused by small worms that floated through the air, the planet Saturn at certain times, sexual contact between a man and a sick woman, or contact with the New World.

Question 13

What did Galen say about the circulation of the blood in the body and what effect did this have?

Answer 13

Said blood passes through the septum, and the heart pumps it to the muscles, where it is burned up. Was considered right for 1500 years

Question 14

What did the Persian doctor Ibn an Nafis say about the circulation of blood in the body in 1250 and what effect did this have?

Answer 14

Said blood does not go through the septum, and is pumped past the lungs. Very little on Europe medicine as he was not known of in Europe.

Question 15

What did Leonardo Da Vince discover about the circulation of blood in the body in 1519 and what effect did this have?

Answer 15

Made detailed drawings of the anatomy of the heart but very little effect as drawings were not discovered until 1850.

Question 16

What did Vesalius say about the circulation of blood in the body in 1543 and what effect did this have?

Answer 16

Said blood does not pass through the septum. He wrote a Well-know anatomical textbook

Question 17

What did the Italian preacher Servetus say about the circulation of blood in the body in 1553 and what effect did this have?

Answer 17

Said blood does go through the septum, and is pumped past the lungs.No effect - burned as a heretic

Question 18

What did Colombo say about the circulation of blood in the body in 1559 and what effect did this have?

Answer 18

Said blood does not go through the septum, and is pumped past the lungs. Had an effect because William Harvey read his book

Question 19

What did Fabricius say about the circulation of blood in the body in 1603 and what effect did this have?

Answer 19

Discovered valves in the veins only allow the blood to go one way. Had a lot of effect as he was William Harvey’s teacher at university

Question 20

What did William Harvey eventually prove and when?

Answer 20

Proved that blood circulates round the body, and described how it happened in 1628.

Question 21

What did Ambroise Paré do?

Answer 21

Ambroise Paré changed people’s ideas about surgery. He developed his ideas during his 20 years as a barber-surgeon, when he accompanied the French army on its campaigns. Despite the unpleasant procedures that were part of medicine in his day, it is clear from his writings that Paré cared deeply about his patients.

Question 22

What did Ambroise Pare discover in 1536?

Answer 22

he discovered by chance (when the cautery oil he used to cauterise the wounds of his patients ran out) that wounds healed better if they were treated with a ‘soothing digestive’ (boiled poultice) of yolks and rose oil.
He used catgut ligatures to tie arteries during amputations instead of cauterising the wound.

Question 23

What did Ambroise Pare do in 1575?

Answer 23

he published his ‘Apology and Treatise’, which advocated changes to the way surgeons treated wounds and amputations

Question 24

Who discovered that laudanum could be used as a painkiller?

Answer 24

Paracelsus, a famous German alchemist and surgeon of the period, discovered that laudanum (a derivative of opium) was a painkiller that could be used to help his patients. For many years it was used for general pain such as headaches and period pain (and many people became addicted to it).

Question 25

How could Ambroise Pare’s discover be seen to be a scientific one?

Answer 25

Paré’s discovery was not a scientific experiment, but it had the same effect as one - he was testing cautery as a way of healing. His method was to try something different (““I was forced to use in its place””), he observed the results (““I found those for whom I had used the digestive. Those to whom I had applied the boiling oil I found””), and his conclusion was ““never more to burn thus cruelly poor men wounded with gunshot””.

Question 26

How did doctors try to cure people?

Answer 26

Doctors were utterly unable to cure infectious disease, and were powerless in face of diseases such as the plague and syphilis. They did get some new drugs (eg quinine for malaria) from the New World, but generally treatment was a mixture of superstition and errors.

Question 27

What was wrong with Nicholas Culpepper’s ‘Complete Herbal’ (1653) ?

Answer 27

he advocated the use of opposites
he advised invoking sympathetic planets
he claimed that garden rue was an antidote to all poisons (long after Paré had proved this to be impossible)
he recommended smoking tobacco (then a novel substance from the New World) as a wonder-cure that would expel worms, ease toothache, cure snake bites and kill lice

Question 28

What were some cures for the Plague?

Answer 28

Cures’ for the plague included pieces of paper with the letters abracadabra written in a triangle; a lucky hare’s foot; posies and perfume; smoking tobacco; sherry; dried toad; leeches; a potion of rue, wormwood, vinegar and rose-water; and pressing a plucked chicken against the plague-sores until the chicken died.

Question 29

Who discovered vaccination and why?

Answer 29

In 1796, Edward Jenner discovered how vaccination could prevent disease (he found that infecting people with cowpox protected them from smallpox) - but nothing came of this since no one knew why it did so.

Question 30

What was the Public Health system like?

Answer 30

Early Modern towns were similar to Medieval towns. They did not have systems of sewers or water pipes. They were probably filthy. Garbage and human waste was thrown into the streets. Houses were made of wood, mud and horsedung. Rats, lice and fleas flourished in the rushes that people strewed on the clay floors of their houses.

Question 31

What public health provisions were established during the 1665 Plague in London?

Answer 31

‘Surgeons’ were appointed, who examined the dead to establish the extent of the plague.
Bills of Mortality were published, to publicise the course of the disease.
‘Examiners’ and ‘searchers’ were appointed, who established whether members of a household had contracted the plague. If so, they then shut up the house for a month, and its inhabitants had to stay indoors.
Constables were appointed, who made sure no one left such houses.
Bodies were buried at night in huge pits, and mourners were not allowed to attend.
‘Pest houses’ were set up, to quarantine sufferers.
Householders were ordered to collect all waste, which was then removed by ‘rakers’.
Stray pigs, dogs, rabbits and cats were killed.

Question 32

Did these provisions work?

Answer 32

These measures unfortunately did not stop the spread of the plague, which only ended when the weather turned cold

Question 33

What were the most advanced early modern physicians like?

Answer 33

were well educated and trained
did ‘scientific’ research
were prepared to contradict the accepted authority
disseminated their findings
relied on royal support
had limited success
However, they charged very high fees and only the richest people could afford them.

Question 34

Who did ordinary (poor) people go to for medical care?

Answer 34

country doctors - lower fees than town doctors, but not well-trained
barber-surgeons - who were paid to perform small operations
apothecaries (chemists) - no medical training, but sold medicines and groceries
quacks - travelling barbers, tooth-pullers, who sold medicines which were supposed to cure everything
wise women, neighbours and local ‘witches’