SOC 0477 Lecture 2: med soc notes ch 2
Document Summary
Supernatural explanation of disease: magico-religious view, as in being caused by direct interventions of a god/spirit; foreign object introduced into the body and cured when foreign object forced out. Example: trephination using sharpened stones to drill a hole in the skull. Code of hammurabi: codified set of responsibilities of physicians; other medical texts originated from this (basically written health knowledge) Medical linguistics over 95% of american medical language comes from greek & latin. Aesklipius (son of apollo) = greek god of health. Temples all over greece where physicians practiced. Temple sleep: healing ceremony of incubation where patients would purify/detox before given medicines to sleep, then sacred" snakes would crawl over patients & lick wounds & salves would be applied: claimed 100% healing. Rod of asclepius (comes from temple sleep) Sought natural rather than supernatural explanations of disease and emphasized medical ethics ( first, do no harm ) Humoral theory of disease: a dominant approach for centuries.
