Doctors that made a difference

Student: Pslu Oana Maria Seria C, gr. 19

Coordinating Professor: Ioana Creu

"A doctor, like anyone else who has to deal with human beings, each of them unique, cannot be a scientist; he is either, like the surgeon, a craftsman, or, like the physician and the psychologist, an artist. This means that in order to be a good doctor a man must also have a good character, that is to say, whatever weaknesses and foibles he may have, he must love his fellow human beings in the concrete and desire their good before his own." Auden, W. H

Medicine is a truly fascinating and rewarding career. It's full of challenges and is ever changing as new techniques and drug therapies are developed.Every patient is unique and has an individual response to illness making medicine a fascinating career. No two patients are alike. I wanted to transform and dedicate this project to doctors who remained in history for all their work and dedication.In this way I found out about many doctors that I could say they will remain in my mind and heart as role models, because what they did and how they did ,doctors that changed peoples lives then and they still influence it now. The first doctor I chose is..... Hippocrates!

Make a habit of to things: to help-or at least to do no harm . He made such an impression on medical history that his name is still very much associated with medicine today. All newly qualified doctors take what is called the Hippocratic Oath and some see Hippocrates as the father of modern medicine even though he did most of his work some 430 years before the birth of Christ. We know he founded the Hippocratic School of Medicine. This intellectual school revolutionized medicine in ancient Greece, establishing it as a discipline distinct from other fields that it had traditionally been associated with (notably theurgy and philosophy), thus establishing medicine as a profession. Early life Hippocrates was born on the Aegean island of Cos, just off the Ionian coast near Halicarnassus (island of Greece) during the end of the fifth century B.C.E. He is called Hippocrates Asclepiades, "descendant of (the doctor-god) Asclepios," but it is uncertain whether this descent was by family or merely by his becoming attached to the medical profession. Legend likewise places him in the family line of the hero Hercules. Son of Heracleides and Praxithea, Hippocrates's family's wealth permitted him to have a good educational beginning as a child. After nine years of physical education, reading, writing, spelling, music, singing, and poetry, he went to a secondary school, where he spent two years and had very thorough athletic training.

It is likely that he went on to study medicine under his father in a form of apprenticeship (arrangement to learn a trade through work experience). This involved following his father and another doctor, Herodicos, from patient to patient and observing their treatment. It is believed that his training included traveling to the Greek mainland and possibly to Egypt and Libya to study medical practices.

Adult talents Hippocrates is credited with healing many, including the king of Macedonia whom he examined and helped to recover from tuberculosis (disease of the lungs). His commitment to healing was put to the test when he battled the plague (a bacteria-caused disease that spreads quickly and can cause death) for three years in Athens (430427 B.C.E. ). It is also clear that the height of his career was during the Peloponnesian War (431404 B.C.E. ). His teaching was as well-remembered as his healing. A symbol of the many students he encouraged is the "Tree of Hippocrates," which shows students sitting under a tree listening to him. In time he apprenticed his own sons, Thessalus and Draco, in the practice of medicine. The teacher and doctor role combined well in 400 B.C.E. , when he founded a school of medicine in Cos. Hippocrates held the belief that the body must be treated as a whole and not just a series of parts. He accurately described disease symptoms and was the first physician to accurately describe the symptoms of pneumonia, as well as epilepsy in children. He believed in the natural healing process of rest, a good diet, fresh air and cleanliness. He noted that there were individual differences in the severity of disease symptoms and that some individuals were better able to cope with their disease and illness than others. He was also the first physician that held the belief that thoughts, ideas, and feelings come from the brain and not the heart as others of him time believed ."Men believe only that it is a divine disease because of their ignorance and amazement.", he says in the The Sacred Disease.

Hippocrates was not only a great physician,but a great man and all his studies and work helped other people.I also admire him because in a country where everyone had their favorite Greek God ( and they had many to chose from! ) he insisted on making a difference between medicine and priestcraft, and directing exclusive attention to the natural history of disease. He shows how strongly his mind revolted against the use of charms, amulets, incantations and such devices appears from his writings. Author of books: Aphorisms Instruments of Reduction Of the Epidemics On Airs, Waters, and Places On Ancient Medicine On Fistulae On Fractures On Hemorrhoids On Injuries of The Head On Regimen in Acute Diseases On the Articulations On the Sacred Disease On the Surgery On Ulcers The Book of Prognostics The Law The Oath Namesakes Some clinical symptoms and signs have been named after Hippocrates as he is believed to be the first person to describe those. Hippocratic face is the change produced in the countenance by death, or long sickness, excessive evacuations, excessive hunger, and the like. Clubbing, a deformity of the fingers and fingernails, is also known as Hippocratic fingers. Hippocratic succussion is the internal splashing noise of hydropneumothorax or pyopneumothorax. Hippocratic bench (a device which uses tension to aid in setting bones) and Hippocratic cap-shaped bandage are two devices named after Hippocrates.

Hippocratic Corpus and Hippocratic Oath are also his namesakes. The drink hypocras is also believed to be invented by Hippocrates. Risus sardonicus, a sustained spasming of the face muscles may also be termed the Hippocratic Smile. In the modern age, a lunar crater has been named Hippocrates. The Hippocratic Museum, a museum on the Greek island of Kos is dedicated to him. In the Harry Potter book series, the main healer on Arthur Weasley's ward was named Hippocrates Smethwyck. The Hippocrates Project is a program of the New York University Medical Center to enhance education through use of technology. Project Hippocrates (an acronym of "HIgh PerfOrmance Computing for RobotAssisTEd Surgery") is an effort of the Carnegie Mellon School of Computer Science and Shadyside Medical Center, "to develop advanced planning, simulation, and execution technologies for the next generation of computerassisted surgical robots." Both the Canadian Hippocratic Registry and American Hippocratic Registry are organizations of physicians who uphold the principles of the original Hippocratic Oath as inviolable through changing social times.

Hippocratic fingers and a 12th-century Byzantine manuscript of the Oath in the form of a cross.

References Asimov, I., (1982). Asimov's Biographical Encyclopedia of Science and Technology (2nd Revised Edition). Garden City, New York: Doubleday. Collier, P.F., Oath and Law of Hippocrates (1910). Harvard Classics Volume 38 (Online) gopher..//ftp.std.com//00/obi/book/Hippocrates/Hippocratic.Oath (November 11, 1997). Debus, A.G., (1968) World Who's Who In Science: A Biographical Dictionary of Notable Scientists from Antiquity to the Present. Chicago: Marquis Hippocrates. Encyclopedia Britannica (Online) http://www.eb.com/Hippocrates (November 12, 1997) Hippocrates Web Page.Asclepeion Hospital - Athens (Online) http://www/forthnet.gr.asclepeion/hippo/htm (November 11, 1997) Hippocrates: The "Greek Miracle" in Medicine. Ancient Medicine (Online) http://web1.ea.pvt.K12.pa.us/medant/hippint.htm#history (November 12, 1997) Porter, R., (1994). The Biographical Dictionary of Scientists. Second Edition. New York: Oxford University Press. Penfield, W., The Mystery of the Mind (1978). Princeton: Princeton University Press

The second doctor I chose to talk about in this project is Theodoric Borgognoni (1205-1296).Its not beacuse he lived a lot, but because he is considered to be the best surgeon of the Middle Ages.

Life

Theodoric Borgognoni was born in Lucca, Italy in 1205. He may well have been the son of Master Ugo Borgognoni, a leading physician of the previous generation, and was certainly a student of his. Theodoric studied medicine at the University of Bologna becoming a Dominican friar in the same period. In the 1240s, he became personal physician to Pope Innocent IV. In 1262 he was made Bishop of Bitonto. He then served as Bishop of Cervia, close to Ravenna, from 1266 until his death in 1296.

Achievements Borgognoni practiced surgery in addition to his episcopal and religious duties. Despite this, he became the favoured practitioner of many leading personages, including the pope. His major medical work is the Cyrurgia, a systematic four volume treatise covering all aspects of surgery. The book broke with many traditional surgical practices handed down from the ancient Greeks and the Arabic surgeons. Borgognoni was significant in stressing the importance of personal experience and observation as opposed to a blind reliance upon the ancient sources. He insisted that the practice of encouraging the development of pus in wounds, handed down from Galen and from Arabic medicine be replaced by a more antiseptic approach, with the wound being cleaned and then sutured to promote healing. Bandages were to be pre-soaked in wine as a form of disinfectant. He also promoted the use of aneasthetics in surgery. A sponge soaked in a dissolved solution of opium, mandrake, hemlock, mulberry juice, ivy and other substances was held beneath the patients nose to induce unconsciousness. In addition to his surgical works, Borgognoni also produced volumes on veterinary medicine and falconry. The Cyrurgia

The Cyrurgia, or Chirurgia, (Surgery), is Borgognoni's major contribution to western medicine. Written in the mid 13th Century, it is a four volume work that covers the major fields of medieval surgery. On the treatment of wounds he wrote: "For it is not necessary that bloody matter (pus) be generated in wounds -- for there can be no error greater than this, and nothing else which impedes nature so much, and prolongs the sickness." This went against a longstanding weight of medical thinking. Although often disagreeing with Galen, Borgognoni followed him in promoting the dry method for treating wounds, although advocating the use of wine. He wrote on the treatment of thoracic and intestinal injuries, insisting on the importance of avoiding pollution from the contents of the gut. The final volume deals with injuries to the head and some cancers. Borgognoni's test for the diagnosis of shoulder dislocation, namely the ability to touch the opposite ear or shoulder with the hand of the affected arm, has remained in use into modern times. . There were times when I thought about poeple who lived during those times.Medicine was extremely basic in an era when physicians had no idea what caused the terrible illnesses and diseases. The Catholic Church believed that illnesses were a punishment from God for sinful behaviour. Letting blood was conducted by cupping or leeches. There were no Antibiotics during the Middle Ages and it was almost impossible to cure illness and diseases without them. I was glad to find out about Theodoric,to think that he really made a difference by inventing astiseptics, anesthetics to help pacients not to feel the pain during surgery.Also his books made a difference too- there werent so many anatomy books- or books who studied diseases.And not to forget,we talk about an era when terrible illnesses such as the Black Death were killing nearly one third of the population. Dominique Jean Larrey

The next doctor was not only a surgeon,but a surgeon in Napoleons army.Larrey created everything a wartime medic could need. When he thought they'd need a more efficient way for transporting the medics and the wounded, he commandeered a bunch of French artillery carriages and converted them, thus inventing the ambulance. When he decided he'd like some organization around him, he commandeered a bunch of men and invented medical troops. He wasn't just some surgeon general shouting orders from the outskirts of the battlefield. Although he ranked fairly high in the chain of command, he was right there in the fray whenever he could be, personally performing emergency operations as cannons exploded around him. He was no slouch, either: his personal best was an unimaginable 200 amputations in 24 hours. Unsurprisingly, soldiers loved Larrey. He was treated as a hero wherever he went, to the point where weary and defeated French troops actually lifted him above their heads and crowd-surfed him during Napoleon's retreat from Russia -- just so that he'd be the first one to safety. At Waterloo in 1815 his courage under fire was noticed by the Duke of Wellington who ordered his soldiers not to fire in his direction so as to 'give the brave man time to gather up the wounded' and saluted 'the courage and devotion of an age that is no longer ours'.

Larrey was taken prisoner by the Prussians and condemned to death. However, he was recognized by one of the German surgeons, who pleaded for his life. Perhaps partly because he had saved the life of Blcher's son when he was wounded and taken prisoner by the French, he was pardoned and taken back to France under escort. He devoted the remainder of his life to writing and a civilian medical career. He died on July 25, 1842 in Lyon. Often considered the first modern military surgeon, Larrey's writings are still regarded as valuable sources of surgical and medical knowledge and have been translated into all modern languages. References Baker D, Cazala JB, Carli P (September 2005), "Resuscitation great. Larrey and Percya tale of two barons", Resuscitation 66 (3): 25962, doi:10.1016/j.resuscitation.2005.03.009, PMID 15990216 Beasley AW (December 2000), "To study the healing art", The Australian and New Zealand Journal of Surgery 70 (12): 8927, doi:10.1046/j.14401622.2000.01989.x, PMID 11167578 Bodemer CW (July 1982), "Baron Dominique Jean Larrey, Napoleon's surgeon", Bulletin of the American College of Surgeons 67 (7): 1821, PMID 10315971 Brewer LA (December 1986), "Baron Dominique Jean Larrey (1766 1842). Father of modern military surgery, innovater, humanist", The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery 92 (6): 10968, PMID 3537533 Csillag I (February 1984), "Ferenc Eckstein and military surgery during the Napoleonic wars (Dominique-Jean Larrey)" (in Hungarian), Orvosi Hetilap 125 (8): 46770, PMID 6366693 DiGioia JM, Rocko JM, Swan KG (May 1983), "Baron Larrey. Modern military surgeon", The American Surgeon 49 (5): 22630, PMID 6342487 Feinsod, Moshe (2002), "The amputated lega tale of scientific curiosity 1792", Harefuah 141 (2): 2102, 220, 2002 Feb, PMID 11905097 Feinsod, M (1998), "The surgeon and the Emperora humanitarian on the battlefield", Harefuah 135 (9): 3403, 408, 1998 Nov 1, PMID 10911440