-
Period: 4000 BCE to 3000 BCE
Early Beginnings
-
3900 BCE
Disease Caused By?
They thought the diseases were caused by bad spirts -
3600 BCE
Treatments for sick?
They ‘treated’ the sick by trying to exorcise the evil spirits. This basically means they tried to pray the sickness away. -
3100 BCE
Medicines used today?
They used 4 main medicines; digitalis — a medicine that came from a foxglove plant, used to treat heart conditions —, Quinine — found from cinchona trees bark used to control some sickness —, Belladonna — a medicine found in a nightshade plant that can be used to relieve GI pain —, and Morphine — found from an opium poppy, used to treat severe pain—. -
Period: 2999 BCE to 399
Ancient Times
-
2900 BCE
Ancient Egyptians
The first people to keep accurate health records. In the Egyptian culture the Priests would act as physicians. They also called upon God to heal them. -
1900 BCE
Ancient Chinese
First people to use primitive acupuncture therapies. Learned to treat different illnesses with stone tools. -
900 BCE
Ancient Greek
The Ancient Greek were the first to discover that maybe the diseases might be natural. They used records to observe what could be causing illnesses. Religion prevented bodies from being dissected. Hippocrates based knowledge of anatomy off of what he could observe about the external body because dissection wasn’t used. -
100
Ancient Romans
The romans were the first to organize medical care: They created public buildings for the sick in which physicians were sent medical equipment to care for the sick, doctors wore beaked masks with spices at the end to help eliminate odor and the spread of disease, and the government paid the Romans for their work. -
Period: 400 to 800
Dark Age
-
500
Stopped the study of medicine, why?
The church believed that life and death was in Gods hands. -
700
How do they treat disease?
Primary treatment shifted from medicines to prayer. The limited amount of medicines they did use where herbal mixtures. -
Period: 800 to 1400
Middle Ages
-
1100
Epidemics
Millions of death caused from epidemics. The diseases (like Bubonic plague, smallpox, and tuberculosis) could not be controlled very well without much knowledge on vaccines or how diseases spread. -
Period: 1350 to
The Renaissance
-
1450
Rebirth
People started looking back into sickness and medical cases. Schools were built for research and dissection for the study of the body became accepted. Printing press and the publishing of books was developed further expanding research. -
Period: 1501 to
16th and 17th Centuries
-
1515
Leonardo Da Vinci
Studied and recorded the anatomy of the body. (Could draw good diagrams as an artist) -
1550
Gabriele Fallopius
Discovered the Fallopian tubes in the women reproductive system. -
1563
Bartolommeo Eustachio
Discover the tube that leads from the ear to the throat. Was named the Eustachian Tube. -
William Harvey
Was able to describe the circulation of blood and the pumping of the heart. -
Antonie von Leeuwenhoek
Invented the microphone which established that there was life smaller than the eye could see. Found out the bacteria on teeth causes tooth decay. Germs that caused sickness were visible — not realized. -
Apothecaries
Early pharmacy’s were started. Engaged a flourishing trade of drugs and spices in the east. -
Period: to
18th Century
-
Benjamin Franklin
Discovered bifocals (glasses) and that colds could be spread. -
Medical students learning
Students attended lectures and could observe patients at the bedside. When a patients would die they were allowed to dissect it and learn about the disease process. Resulted in a better understanding of of the causes of illness and diseases. -
Joseph Priestley
Discovered the element oxygen. Discovered that plants recycle carbon into oxygen to make it usable for respiration. -
Edward Jenne
Discovered a vaccination against small-pox, this saved millions of lives. His discovery led to immunization and preventative medicine. -
Rene Laennec
Invented the stethoscope. Provided a better ability to hear the heart and lungs and determine if a disease was present. -
Period: to
The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries
-
Ignaz Semmelweis
Identified the cause of childbed fever which had caused many death in women after childbirth. Hand washing and cleanliness became an accepted practice. -
Florence Nightingale
Florence Nightingale founded Nightingale School of Nursing which brought in many to-be nurses who then raised the standards of nursing and led nursing to be a respectable job. -
Louis Pasteur
Discovered that tiny microorganisms where everywhere. Discovered the microorganisms where the cause of disease when before it was believed that they was created by disease. Pasteurization kills bacteria in milk — still used today. -
Dmitri Ivanovski
Discovered so diseases where caused by microorganisms thats can’t be seen under a microscope, called viruses. -
Joseph Lister
Used carbolic acid on wounds to kill infection-causing germs. First doctor to use antiseptic during surgery to prevent infection. -
Ernst von Bergmann
Developed asepsis — a method to keep an area germ-free before and during surgery. -
Robert Koch
Discovered nay disease-causing organisms. Identified a method to identify pathogens and isolated the bacterium that causes tuberculosis. -
Paul Ehrlich
Discovered the effect of medicine on disease-causing microorganisms. Brought about the use of chemicals to fight disease. He found a treatment for syphilis. -
Wilhelm Roentgen
Discovered x-rays and took the first x-ray of his wife’s hand. Discovery allowed doctos to see inside the body. -
Anesthesia
Before anesthesia came along physicians had to get creative with the ways of reducing surgery pain. Sometimes mixes of herbs were used and other times patients were chocked into unconsciousness. Many patients would die of shock. Eventually, researchers discovered drugs that would but patients in a deep sleep to prevent surgery pain. -
Sir Alexander Fleming
Found that penicillin killed life-threatening bacteria. Can cure illnesses that killed many people before its discovery. Some of these illnesses are: pneumonia, gonorrhea, and blood poisoning -
Sigmund Freud
Determined that the mind and body worked together by the discovery that there are conscious and unconscious parts of the mind. His studies were the basis of psychology and psychiatry. -
Gerhard Domagk
Discovered sulfonamide compounds which were the first medications effective in killing bacteria. -
Jonas Salk
Discovered that a dead polio virus would cause immunity to poliomyelitis which was a disease that could cripple and kill people. The vaccine saved many people. -
Albert Sabin
Used a live polio virus vaccine which was more efficient and is now used to immunize babies. -
Francis Crick and James Watson
Discovered the structure of DNA. Could explain how DNA replicates and how hereditary information is coded on it. They won a Nobel Prize in Medicine for their discovery. -
Christian Barnard
Preformed the first successful heart transplant. -
Ben Carson
Pioneer in separating Siamese twins, performing hemispherectomies, and surgery’s on the brain to stop seizures. -
Period: to
21st Century
-
FMRIS
These are functional MRI’s and unlike normal MRI’s, where you could see what the brain looks like, FMRI’s show you what the brain is doing. -
Gene editing to cure disease
With the advancement of gene editing diseases that are caused at the molecular level can now be looked at and potentially even cured with the use of gene editing. Researchers are targeting sickle-cell disease. -
Completion of the Human Genome Draft
The first graft of a human genome was completed. With the replicate of human DNA doctors are able to get to work finding out what happens to out DNA when a virus or sickness hits which can help to find cures and vaccines. -
Smart Pills
Can communicate to the users of smart pills whether or not they took their medicine my communicating to a smartphone app. Can also be a helpful tool for doctors in determining the state of a patient -
Acute stroke intervention
Pills and drugs can now me taken to break up clots and blockages in the heart in a hopeful attempt to prevent strokes and heart related problems.