Dawn of Scientific Medicine

Dr. Alok Acharya

Asst. Professor
Dept. of Community Medicine
Nobel Medical College
25/08/23 04:57 AM 2
 The period following 1500 A.D. was
marked by revolutions – political,
industrial, religious and medical.
 Political revolutions took place in France

and America, people claiming their just

rights.
 The industrial revolution in the West
brought great benefits leading to an
improvement in the standard of living
among people.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 3
Revival of Medicine

 The revival of medicine encompasses

the period from 1453-1600 AD.
 It was an age of individual scientific

endeavour.
 The distinguished personalities during

this period were:

25/08/23 04:57 AM 4
Paracelsus (1493-1541)

 Revived medicine
 Swiss-born Paracelsus

publicly burnt the

works of Galen and
Avicenna and attacked
superstition and
dogma and helped
turn medicine towards
rational research.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 5
Fracastorius (1483-1553)

 Theory of contagion
 Italian physician
 Transfer of infection via

minute invisible particles

and explained the cause of
epidemics. .
 Recognized that syphilis

transmitted during sexual

relation.
 Founder of epidemiology.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 6
Andreas Vasalius (1514-1564)

 Did lot of
dissections on the
human body.
 He raised the study

of anatomy to a
science and called
the first man of
modern science

25/08/23 04:57 AM 7
Ambroise pare (1510-1590)

 A French Army
surgeon did for
surgery and
earned the title
“father of surgery”

25/08/23 04:57 AM 8
 In
1540, the United Company of
Barber Surgeons was established in
England, which later became the Royal
College of Surgeons.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 9
 Thomas Sydenham(1624-1689)
 He made a differential
diagnosis of scarlet
fever, malaria, dysentry
and cholera.
 Also regarded as the

first distinguished
epidemiologist.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 10
 The 17th and 18th centuries were full of even
more exciting discoveries,
 Harvey (1628)- ------------circulation of

blood
 Leeuwenhoek (1670)- -----microscope
 Jenner 1796- -----vaccine against smallpox
 However, the progress in medicine as well as

surgery, during the 19th century would not

have been possible but for Morgagni (1682-
1771) who founded a new branch of medical
science, pathologic anatomy.
25/08/23 04:57 AM 11
Sanitary awakening
 Another historic milestone in the evolution
of medicine is the “great sanitary
awakening” which took place in England in
the mid nineteen century and gradually
spread to other countries.
 The industrial revolution of the 18th century

sparked off numerous problems- creation

of slums, overcrowding, accumulation of
filth in cities and towns, high sickness and
death rates.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 12
This is Edwin Chadwick creating Great
Britain's first public health law.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 13
 The mean age at death in London was
reported to be 44 years for the gentry
and professionals, and22 years for the
working class, in 1842 .
 Add to this, the frequent visitations of

cholera compounded the misery of the

people.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 14
 The great cholera epidemic of 1832 led
Edwin Chadwick, a lawyer in England to
investigate the health of the inhabitants of
the large towns with a view to improve the
conditions under which they lived.
 Chadwick’s report on the sanitary

conditions of the labouring population in

Great Britain.
 Improve housing and working condition.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 15
 Chadwick's report focused the attention
of the people and government on the
urgent need to improve public health.
 Filth was recognized as man’s greatest

enemy and with this began an anti-filth

crusade, the “great sanitary awakening”
which led to the enactment of the public
health act of 1848 in England.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 16
Rise of public
 The above events led to the birth of
public health concept around 1840.
 Johanna Peter Frank (1745-1821),

conceived public health as good

health laws.
 The public health act of 1848, about

the state’s responsibility for the

health of its people.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 17
 Cholera which is often called the "father of
public health" appeared time and again in
the western world during the 19th century.
 John Snow , studied the epidemiology of

cholera in London and established the role

of polluted drinking water in the spread of
cholera in 1854
 William Budd in 1856 by careful observation

of an out break of typhoid fever in rural area

concluded that the spread was by drinking
water.
25/08/23 04:57 AM 18
 John Simon (1816-1904), the first medical
officer of health of London, built up a
system of public health in England which
become the admiration of the rest of the
world.
 This early phase of public health (1880-

1920) is often called the “disease control

phase”. Efforts were directed entirely
towards general cleanliness, garbage and
refuse disposal.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 19
 Bythe beginning of the 20th century,
the broad foundations of public heath
– clean water, clean surroundings,
wholesome condition of house,
control of offensive trade, etc were led
in all the countries of the western
world.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 20
Germ theory of disease
 For long, man was groping in darkness
about the causation of disease.
 Several theories were advanced from

time to time to explain disease causation

such as the supernatural theory of
disease, the theory of humors by Greeks
and Indians, the theory of contagion, the
miasmatic theory which attributed
disease to noxious air and vapours, the
theory of spontaneous generation, etc.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 21
Germ theory of disease cont…
 The breakthrough came in 1860, when the

French bacteriologist Louis pasteur

demonstrated the presence of bacteria in air.
 He disproved the theory of "spontaneous

generation''.
 In 1873, Pasteur advanced the "germ theory

of disease".
 In 1877, Robert Koch showed that anthrax

was caused by a bacteria.

 The discoveries of Pasteur and Koch
confirmed the germ theory of disease.
 Then pneumococcus in 1880, tubercle bacillus

in 1882, cholera vibrio in 1883 and so on.

25/08/23 04:57 AM 22
 Allattention was focussed on
microbes and their role in disease
causation.
 The germ theory of disease came to

the forefront, supplanting the earlier

theories of disease causation.
 Medicine finally shed the rags of

dogma and superstition and put on

the robes of scientific knowledge.
25/08/23 04:57 AM 23
Birth of preventive medicine
 It developed as a branch of medicine
distinct from public health.
 It came into existence even before the

causative agents of disease were known.

 James Lind advocated the intake of fresh

fruit and vegetables for the prevention

of scurvy in 1753.
 Edward Jenner discovered vaccination

against small pox in 1796.

 These two discoveries marked the
beginning of a new era, the era of
disease prevention by specific measures.
25/08/23 04:57 AM 24
 Preventive medicine got a firm foundation
only after the discovery of causative
agents of disease and establishment of
the germ theory of disease.
 The latter part of the 19th century marked

by such discoveries in preventive

medicine as Pasteur’s anti-rabies
treatment 1883, cholera vaccine 1892,
diphtheria antitoxin (1894), anti-typhoid
vaccine (1898), antiseptics and
disinfectants (1827-1912), etc. .

25/08/23 04:57 AM 25
A further advance was the elucidation of
the modes of disease transmission.
 For example, in 1896, Bruce, a British

Army surgeon, demonstrated that the

African sleeping sickness was
transmitted by tsetse fly.
 In 1898, Ross demonstrated that malaria

was transmitted by the Anopheles.

 In 1900, Walter Reed and his colleagues

demonstrated that yellow fever was

transmitted by the Aedes mosquito.
25/08/23 04:57 AM 26
 With the knowledge derived from bacteriology,
it became possible to control disease by
specific measures such as blocking the
channels of transmission, e.g., quarantine,
water purification, pasteurization of milk,
protection of foods, proper disposal of
sewage, destruction of insects and
disinfection.
 .

25/08/23 04:57 AM 27
 The development of laboratory
methods for the early detection of
disease was a further advance.
 In its early years, preventive medicine

was equated with the control of

infectious diseases.
 The modern concepts of primary,

secondary and tertiary prevention

were not known
25/08/23 04:57 AM 28
THANK YOU

25/08/23 04:57 AM 29