A century ago, Australians were battling another pandemic, tuberculosis, with public health measures many will find familiar today.
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Articles on Medical history
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Experts recommend adopted children be told about their origins, no matter how difficult the circumstances, but doing so is tricky for adoptive parents.
Humans can identify asymptomatic cases, build trust and assauge fears. Apps cannot.
Florence Nightingale, who would have turned 200 today, might be remembered for her work during the Crimean War. But that’s ignoring the 54 years afterwards she spent writing, analysing and agitating.
The cities of Europe have experienced disease outbreaks for centuries, but they were able to bounce back using quarantine, economic stimulus and patience. Not all were successful.
The official naming of COVID-19 has the tone of a committee decision. Historically, names for diseases have not been quite so well thought out and were more likely to offend.
Australia’s hospitals have come a long way from the huts of convict times to the well thought-out spaces we see today.
From vibrators for ‘hysteria’ to vibrating belts for weightloss. How we’ve been fascinated with shaking ourselves to health.
The ‘turf war’ between doctors and pharmacists we see in current debates has a long history.
Doctors have long taken up global issues, from nuclear war to ozone depletion and climate change, and helped shift the course of history.
Hernán Cortés owed his conquest of the Aztecs to his expedition’s unknown, unseen secret weapon: the smallpox virus. Disease epidemics can set the course of human history.
If the curative thesis is true, then most medicine throughout history – as well as much contemporary medicine – isn’t medicine at all.
It’s shocking to read reports of people who worked as doctors for years without having the qualifications to do so, because we trust our medical professionals. So, how do these imposters do it?
Tuberculosis has had a significant impact on the world, from influencing fashion trends to helping understand how the human body works.
Statues of a racist medical experimenter are an affront to the American public.
Some people have objected to childhood vaccination since it was introduced in the late 1700s. And their reasons sound remarkably familiar to those of anti-vaxxers today.
A man in China had 12kg of compacted faeces and a large part of his gut removed by surgeons. The patient was suffering from a rare disorder known as Hirschsprung’s disease.
Terrifying accounts of surgery 200 years ago remind us how far general anaesthesia has come. Yet we still know little about how anaesthetics alter consciousness.
When commemorating our troops, doctors and nurses this Anzac Day, consider also tipping your hat to the discovery of bacteriophages. In the post-antibiotic era, our health might just depend on them.
2017 marks the 200th anniversary since the 1817 publication of Dr James Parkinson’s seminal work on what he called the “Shaking Palsy”.
Top contributors
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Lecturer, Pharmacology, Women's Health, School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Western Australia
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Professor Emerita, Classical Studies, The Open University
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Senior Lecturer in the History of Science, Technology and Medicine, King's College London
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Melissa Sweet is a Friend of The Conversation.
Independent journalist and health writer; Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Sydney School of Public Health, University of Sydney; Founder of Croakey.org. PhD candidate, University of Canberra
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Professor of Communication and Media Studies, Director, News and Media Research Centre, University of Canberra
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Senior Lecturer, Centre for Nursing and Midwifery Research, James Cook University
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Research Fellow, University of Sydney
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Chancellor's Professor of Medicine, Liberal Arts, and Philanthropy, Indiana University
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Professor of Midwifery, Associate Dean Research and HDR, Midwifery Discipline Leader, Western Sydney University
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Senior Lecturer in 19th and 20th-century North American History, University of Liverpool
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Associate Professor of History, University of Wollongong
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Director, Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation, Smithsonian Institution
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Professor of Philosophy of Science, Durham University
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Senior Lecturer in Australian History, Flinders University
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Affiliate, College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University
