HIST 3724 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Heroic Medicine, Webmd, Grave Robbery
History: 1/30/18
Late 18th early 19th century
Traditional medicine - look to past to find treatment/cures (opp of modern day)
Basic methods of treating illness endured as tradition codified in learned texts, family
bibles, recipes, wisdom
therapeutics= biologicals (nature) and minerals
Most cures required grace of God
Humoral Theory - temperaments (4, general)
Each person tends toward 1 temperament but everyone has own unique
temperament and unique constitutional makeup (all are unique but also conform to a type)
Each person made of 4 humors (names differ over time/culture) but idea
persisted. Each humor associated with an element, certain temperments, the seasons, the
weather/climate.
Health = balance; out of equilibrium/unbalanced == sickness
Theory of body and theory of health/pathology
Constitution made of gender, age, physiological cues, ethnicity/nationality,
religion, social class, occpation, habits, morality
Some are physiological, some are social
When sick, your constitution in constant interaction w/ environ
Very holistic theory
Miasma
“Bad air” - prevailing idea that illness caused by poison coming out of the ground or in
the air. Unnatural, uncontrollable forces that were very strong/disastrous but also talked about
illness as an interaction with the environment.
Heroic Medicine - more extreme measure, the more heroic it was
Try to balance your body...bloodletting, leeches, things to make you throw up and clear
out system,
The medical marketplace
Emergence of modern medical profession in late 18th cent, early 19th cent
Open, bustling, unregulated medical market at this time
“The Medical Repository” -1997 ------> first medical journal in US
like WebMD, home remedies, put power of medicine in hands of women of the
home
Midwives - lots of business and medical authority over female body/family. Men didn’t
attend birth. Midwives - social and medical authority. Went to all normal rites of passage in
family, namely life and death. Relied on by many.
Medicine was largely domestic affair (done at home) . hospital was charitable institution
located in greater density populations (cities), avoided unless last resort. (could go to bleeder,
cupper, bone setter, midwife, apothic, )
Rise of heroic medicine as modern physician barely starts to develop
Modern physician = white male
Document Summary
Traditional medicine - look to past to find treatment/cures (opp of modern day) Basic methods of treating illness endured as tradition codified in learned texts, family bibles, recipes, wisdom therapeutics= biologicals (nature) and minerals. Each person tends toward 1 temperament but everyone has own unique temperament and unique constitutional makeup (all are unique but also conform to a type) Each person made of 4 humors (names differ over time/culture) but idea persisted. Each humor associated with an element, certain temperments, the seasons, the weather/climate. Health = balance; out of equilibrium/unbalanced == sickness. Constitution made of gender, age, physiological cues, ethnicity/nationality, religion, social class, occpation, habits, morality. When sick, your constitution in constant interaction w/ environ. Bad air - prevailing idea that illness caused by poison coming out of the ground or in the air. Unnatural, uncontrollable forces that were very strong/disastrous but also talked about illness as an interaction with the environment.
