Introduction to Health Science

Primitive Times

• Illness caused by supernatural spirits and demons

• Tribal witch doctors performed ceremonies to drive out evil spirits

• Herbs and plants used as medicine

Ancient Egyptians

• Earliest people to keep health records

• Identified diseases

• Used medicine to heal disease

• Splinted fractures

• Used bloodletting

Ancient Chinese

• First to use acupuncture therapies

• Treated disease with stone tools

Ancient Greeks

• Studied causes of disease

• Hippocrates

– The “Father of Medicine”

– Hippocratic Oath

• “Code of Ethics”

• Aristotle

– Dissected animals

Ancient Romans • First to organize medical care

• Early hospitals in homes

• Developed sanitation system

• Claudius Galen (129-199 AD):

– Dissection is key to understanding body

– Could only dissect animals

– Used pulse as a diagnostic tool

Dark and Middle Ages (400 - 1400 AD)

• Study of medicine stopped for over 1000 years

• Medicine practiced in monasteries and convents

Dark and Middle Ages (400 - 1400 AD)

• Used herbal medicine

Plagues and Epidemics during the dark ages

• Bubonic Plague

Even today the plague is still remembered...

–“Ring around the rosies,

–Pocket full of posies,

–Ashes, Ashes, we all fall down!”

The Renaissance (1400 - 1650 AD)

• Rebirth of Science

– Medical schools

– Study of the body by dissection

• Leonardo da Vinci

– Studied and recorded the anatomy of the body

The Renaissance (1400 - 1650 AD)

The Renaissance (1400 - 1650 AD)

• The invention of the Printing Press made books available to study.

Monks copying books in a Monastery prior

to the Renaissance

16th and 17th Century

• William Harvey

– Pumping heart and circulation

16th and 17th Century

• Anton van Leeuwenhoek

– Invented the microscope

18th Century

• Benjamin Franklin

– Invented bifocals because he had trouble seeing

– Electricity

– Many more inventions

18th Century

• Edward Jenner

– Vaccination for smallpox

19th Century • Ignas Semmelweiss

– Cause of childhood fever

– Instituted hand washing

– Died from a cut he received during an autopsy

19th Century

• Rene Laennec – Invented the stethoscope

19th Century • Florence Nightingale

– First school of nursing

– Started during the Crimean War

– Made nursing an honorable profession

19th Century

• Clara Barton

– Established the American Red Cross

19th Century • Louis Pasteur

– Microorganisms cause disease

19th Century • Joseph Lister

– The first doctor to use antiseptic during an operation to prevent infection

19th Century

• Robert Koch • The “Father of Microbiology”

19th Century • Wilhelm Roentgen

– Discovered x-rays

20th Century

• Sigmund Freud

– His studies were the basis of psychology and psychiatry

20th Century • Alexander Fleming

– Discovered Penicillin

20th Century • Jonas Salk

– Discovered a “killed” polio virus vaccine

20th Century • Albert Sabin

– Used a “live” polio vaccine

21st Century

• New approaches to medical care are being discovered every year

• People are taught more about wellness, and learn more about health care

The Medical Profession helps those you love!