Medieval Medicine

A detailed Summary of Medieval Medicine

The medieval period is normally not associated with advances in technology, nor with contributions that benefit society. Yet, our medicine today owes much of its development to physicians of that time. Medicine of that era was strongly influenced by superstition and the doctrine of the Christian church, and did not have much foundation for practical application.

The need for medicine in Middle Ages was certainly great, considering the extreme amounts of plague and disease prevalent during that time (Grigsby 2). Unfortunately, medical knowledge of that day was of very little help (Margotta 68). Physicians had no concept of disease causing bacteria or viruses. Unfortunately, it was thought in that day that illness was either due to old age, heredity, or immoderate living. Is was also believed that certain sins could affect one's health (Grigsby 2).

Medical practice of the time revolved around a concept called the "doctrine of the four humors". Diagnoses of illness almost solely relied upon the examination of the human body's four humors- blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. Each of the four humors was associated with a specific body part and certain elemental qualities. Blood was assoc

Duin, Nancy. A History of Medicine. London: Barnes & Nobel Inc, 1992.

Not all aspects of medieval medicine were as particularly brutal as bloodletting. Pharmacy, or the prescribing of drugs or herbs, was a major part of the medieval physician's cure. Apothecaries were the pharmacists of the day; however, their role in medicine extended further than simply the filling of prescribed drugs. In many cases the Apothecary would actually prescribe drugs and give treatment to a sick patient. Apothecaries usually had no training in the medical field except as herbalists. They had little knowledge of the workings of the human body or diseases that affected it. In fact, since the herbs that Apothecaries used to make their medicines were usually extremely expensive spices, most doubled as merchants (Gottfreid 108).

Hospitals can be dated back as early as ancient Greece. Most hospitals of the middle ages were products of the Christian churches and their principles of charity. The Middle Ages saw the founding of hundreds of hospitals throughout Europe and in the lands influenced by the Crusades. At the highest point of this growth, there were over two hundred hospitals in England and Scotland and more than two thousand hospitals in France (Margotta 69).

Diagnosis, except in the few rare cases, was usually based on the interpretation of the color and smell of the blood, the smell and the color of the phlegm and, most commonly, on the examination of the urine. There were countless methods of examinations, each explaining how a detailed diagnoses of all types of illnesses could be determined from the color and the odor of the urine and from the layers of sediment in the collecting flasks. Cloudiness in the upper layer of the collecting flask indicated that the origin of illness was in the head, and lower level layers of cloudiness indicated declining conditions of the bladder or genital organs. The diagnosis was often optimistic

Some common words found in the essay are:
Middle Ages, Besides Barbers, France Margotta, Medieval Medicine, Medicine Paris, middle ages, margotta 66, Medical Misconceptions, England Scotland, Nobel Inc, Nobel Books, York Smithmark, hospitals middle ages, hospitals middle, gottfreid 108, grigsby 2, 13th century, history medicine, yellow bile, black bile, bile associated,

Approximate Word count = 1309
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: History