CORE 2

?

Before and After

Before

  • people didnt know what caused disease to spread
  • medical treatment was based on the four humours 
  • the influence of the church began to decline
  • a better understanding of the body began to develop
  • more scientific approach

After

  • the role of science and tech improved our ability to diagnose and treat illness
  • emphasis on prevention of illness through vaccinations and changes in lifestyle
  • women have become more involved in medicine
  • government taken on responsibilities for public health
1 of 16

Life Expectancy

  • Industrial revolution was a time of great changes
  • in the mid 18th century various machines were invented that were powered by water or steam and worked quicker than manual workers
  • people moved to the towns to work in factories
  • the conditions in the factories led to ill health 
  • there were often accidents with the machinery
  • the housing in the towns was of poor quality and rooms were damp
  • living conditions were cramped with more than one family per house
  • sewers often ran into waters where people got drinking water from
  • less access to fresh food in rural areas
2 of 16

Killer Diseases

  • Cholera arrived in britain in 1881, people could die within a day and it spread quickly
  • other diseases; Diptheria, Smallpox, TB, Typhoid

Ideas about the causes of disease

  • growing interest in science
  • affected peoples ideas about the cause of disease
  • MIASMA- disease was caused by bad air
  • SPONTANEOUS GENERATION- disease was caused by germs that were produced by flesh and vegetables as they rotted

Treating Cholera-

  • burning the clothes and bedding of the dead person
  • praying
  • cleaning the house
  • smoking cigars
  • lucky charms
  • burning vinegar
  • special mixtures of liquids or pills to cure illness
3 of 16

Edward Jenner and Vaccination

Inoculation

  • a small amount of pus is taken from a sufferers smallpox blister
  • it is spread into a cut of the person being inoculated
  • a mild version of smallpox develops and the person becomes immune

Smallpox Parties

  • Lady Mary Wortley Montague witnessed this procedure in Turkey
  • was keen to protect her children
  • had them inoculated in 1721
  • people had parties where they would be inoculated together
  • not everybody could afford to have it done

Edward Jenner

  • the link only existed between smallpox and cowpox
  • he could not explain how the link worked
  • vaccination was not always successful
  • in 1802 the Jennerian society was set up in London to promote vaccination (vacca is latin for cow)
  • the government provided a grant to pay for people to have vaccinations 
  • doctors opposed Jenners work as they lost money 
  • 1852 government made vaccination compulsary
  • number of smallpox cases dropped dramatically
4 of 16

Germ Theory

  • proved there are microbes in the air that cause decay
  • disproved the theory of spontaneous generation
  • led Robert Koch to identify specific microbes that caused some diseases
  • progress in the prevention and treatment of illness was slow due to having to identify the microbe responsible for each specific disease
  • in 1875 Robert Koch decided to investigate whether bacteria were linked to disease
  • he was funded by the German Government and identified specific microbes that caused the disease anthrax in sheep
  • Koch also found the microbes causing TB in 1882 and Cholera in 1883
  • he found that chemical dyes could be used to stain specific bacteria so they could be easily identified
5 of 16

Research Teams

  • by the end of the 19th century scientific research was usually carried out by a team rather than an individual
  • a team would have more funding and be able to afford more technology
  • working in a team made it easier to check others work
  • each person could have different skills
6 of 16

Doctors and Training

  • in the medieval and renaissance periods doctors learned by studying the works of Galen
  • they would not have done a dissection themselves however may have watched one
  • at the start of the industrial period, a small number of criminals bodys were allowed to be used for dissections in medical schools

Qualifications

  • doctors could set up practises once they had been accepted by the Royal college of surgeons, royal collegeof physicans, or society of apothecaries
  • they introduced examinations before they awarded a certificate

Practical Experience

  • more emphasis on using microscopes and understanding illness aswell as gaining practical experience by observing doctors
  • once qualified, doctors could apply for a position at the hospital working under supervision
  • as medical knowledge advanced doctors divided into specific areas

Dissections

  • body snatchers operated in the 18th and 19th century digging up newly buried corpses for students
  • the government tried to end this practise with the anatomy act of 1832 which allowed licensed anatomists to take the corpse if it wasnt claimed by a relative
7 of 16

John Hunter

  • his lectures on anatomy helped to develop a more professional approach to medical training
  • he emphasised the importance of observation and experiment
  • his students included Edward Jenner 
  • he published several important works including one about the changes that occured in pregnancy
8 of 16

Women in medicine

  • by the mid 19th century women began to demand the right to vote and to be able to attend university
  • womens role in formal medicine was very limited
  • their role in midwifery declined after the invention of forceps in the 17th century because the midwife needed training to use them successfully
  • the most famous male midwife was William Smellie- he would treat the poor for free if his students could attend the birth
  • his lectures were extremely influential 
  • nursing was not yet seen as a respectable career
  • it was not until 1877 that women could qualify as doctors
  • they faced opposition from male doctors who thought they were not intelligent enough
9 of 16

Florence Nightingale; 1820-1910

  • organised care and supplies at a military hospital
  • emphasised cleanliness
  • believed disease was caused by miasma
  • death rate fell from 42% to 2%
  • wrote over 200 books about hospital design and organisation
10 of 16

Elizabeth Garrett Anderson 1836-1917

  • applied to the society of apothecaries
  • refused to accept her but her father took them to court
  • in 1865 they agreed to register her 
  • in 1872 she founded the new hospital for women in London
  • 1876 act of parliament allowed women to enter medical professions
11 of 16

Hospitals and care

Places to be treated

  • 1859 first cottage hospital opened in sussex
  • usually small and provided nursing care
  • 18 voluntary hospitals in london with 4000 beds
  • the middle and upper classes would be treated at home by a doctor
  • some doctors set up a sick club where people pay a weekly fund to cover any treatments
  • the working class could not pay a doctor
  • old, sick, or disabled people entered workhouses 

Government action

  • ordered that poor law unions should join together to build infirmaries that were seperate from the workhouses and had full time doctors appointed to them
  • were paid by local rate payers
  • new asylums for people with mental health issues and fever houses for people with infectious diseases were also built
  • these changes were an improvement but didnt completely seperate the workhouse and medical treatment from the poor
  • in 1887 the birmingham poor law union built a new infirmary with 1100 beds but 1500 people were still housed in workhouses
12 of 16

factors in the development of hospital care

  • nightingales work in regulating the training of nurses was a signifcant factor
  • pasteurs work on germs also had an impact on hospitals, Joseph Lister began to use carbolic acid for antiseptic conditions 
13 of 16

Patent Medicines and Pharmacies

  • apothecaries sold many preparations which they advertised as being a cure for everything
  • they came in the form of potions, ointments, pills, and were made of things such as alcohol, lard, wax, turpentine, ginger, and arsenic
  • the ingredients for pills were made into a paste and shaped by hand
  • for the rich, they may be covered in gold or silver to make them attractive and easier to swallow
  • William Brockedon invented a machine to make standardised pills that were produced quicker than hand made
  • Thomas Beecham began selling his pills in 1847 and Jesse Boot a herbalist from Nottingham transformed his family shop into a chain of pharmacies 
  • the growth of the chemical industry meant that companies such as Boots and Beecham could produce their own brand of medicines on a national basis
  • Hospitals could offer care for the sick but not cure, most illneses were still being treated in the home
  • the poor were likely to rely on these patent medicines or on traditional remedies
14 of 16

Change and Continuity

  • the great ormand street hospital was opened in 1852 and contained only 10 beds
  • the emphasis was on medicine as a science and a professional approach to the design of hospital wards and to nursing care
  • advances in medicine were sometimes slow to reach ordinary people due to resistance to change
  • the role of the newspaper and photographs meant people became more aware of problems and public pressure sometimes forced change
15 of 16

The Work of the Historian

  • in 1665 when there was an epidemic of the plague, Women were employed as searchers to record the number of the dead
  • if somebody died of the plague their whole family was locked in their house to prevent spreading
  • before the 19th century poplulation detals were not very accurate
  • most priests kept records of births and  deaths but this was not sent to any central government office
  • many of these records have been lost
  • in 1801 the governent ordered every parish to send in details about the number of houses and the number of families in their area
16 of 16

Comments

No comments have yet been made

Similar History resources:

See all History resources »See all Medicine through time (OCR History A) resources »