Medicine Through Time - Key Individuals

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Key Individual: William Harvey

Occupation: Lecturer in anatomy

Discovery:

How the blood was circulated; identified the difference between arteries and veins; Proved that Galen was wrong about the structure of the heart.

Positive Impact:

- Enhanced the knowledge of the human anatomy

- Lead to blood transfusions for treatment (Long term impact)

- Provided the start for individuals to do observations themselves, and not believe in things unless their is clear evidence backing it up.

Negative Impact:

- His ideology couldn't be linked to treatment at first.

- Doctors at the time were reluctant to admit that Galen had been wrong, hence why it took many years to change their minds.

Key Individual: Andreas Vesalius

Occupation: Anatomist/Physician.

What did he do:

- Studied anatomy and did dissections

- Did his own dissections and wrote books based on his observations using accurate diagrams to illustrate

his work. His most famous book was ‘On The Fabric of the Human Body’ written in 1543

- Disproved Galen's ideas about the human jawbone and skeletal structure.

Positive Impact:

- Encouraged doctors to dissect and look for themselves rather than believing what they were taught (Long term impact)

- Encouraged doctors to carry out detailed observations of their work

- Improve the training of doctors by printing thousands of copies of his book (thanks to the printing press)

Negative Impact:

- His ideology couldn't be linked to treatment at first.

- Doctors at the time were reluctant to admit that Galen had been wrong

Key Individual: Ambroise Paré

Occupation: Battlefield surgeon

What did he do:

Significantly changed people's ideas about surgery by:

- Developing ligatures to seal wounds to help treat blood loss

- Carried out an experiment to disprove Galen by proving the bezoar stone isn’t a treatment for position.

- In 1575 he published his 'Apology and Treatise', which advocated changes to the way surgeons treated wounds and amputations.

Factors: Technology

Printing Press:

- Produce medical books cheaply and quickly, such as those of Harvey and Vesalius.

- Knowledge and ideas could be shared across the world easily

- More people learned to read because there were more books available to read.

Microscopes:

- Analyse dissections in-depth - better knowledge of the anatomy of the body.

Factors: Religion

Collapse of the Catholic Church:

- Became less powerful after the Reformation which resulted in the Church no longer controlling medical training

- Therefore dissections were allowed, and that there was more scope for challenging the old ideas and less emphasis on