During the Middle Ages, there was no formal medical training and anyone who treated the sick was considered a physician. Over time, universities were established to train doctors, though training was based more on practice than studies. Key medical texts by Galen discussed anatomy, the heart, pulse, and treating fever. Herbal medicines were commonly used as technology had not yet developed chemical drugs. Women traditionally served as midwives and some began practicing more medicine. One of the first autopsies helped advance anatomical understanding, though doctors incorrectly blamed planetary alignments for spreading diseases like the Plague.
1. By: Amanda Gutierrez Personal Selected Reading Science and Medicine in the Middle Ages
2. Medicine in the Middle Ages During the Middle Ages, there was no formal training to become a physician. “Certified” physicians taught others how to care for and heal the ill. Anyone who took care of a sick person was considered to be a physician.
3. Medicine in the Middle Ages As time went on, there were universities set in place for people to become properly trained doctors. Although, they were still ore based off practice and skill than studies. Elder doctors simply showed them how to practice. There were four texts, written by a man named Galen, regarding education to become a physician. The first text talked about the good and the bad schools of physicians The second explained the heart The third talked about the pulse And the fourth text taught a student how to cure a fever
4. Medicine in the Middle Ages Doctors began studying and experimenting with herbal drugs: learning how to use them, and how to prescribe safe dosages. They did not have the technologies to develop chemical drugs yet, so they relied on herbal medicines.
5. Medicine in the Middle Ages Women were always the traditional mid-wives to aid there daughters, sisters, and cousins through the process of giving birth. Because the women were around medical practices such as those, their fathers (who were doctors) thought it was appropriate to teach them their practice to carry on the family business. Women were soon involved in a lot more than just being mid-wives.
6. Medicine in the Middle Ages Learning more about the human body was almost impossible without knowing what was inside. Previously, anatomical studies were always done with animals, but a man named Mondino de’ Luzzi took it upon himself to write the first in-depth text on the human body. He wrote the text from his experience of performing an autopsy on two deceased pregnant women. This was one of the first medical autopsies performed on a human body.
7. Medicine in the Middle Ages The Plague broke out, and physicians couldn’t understand the concept of infection. They determined that people were becoming sick in increasing numbers because of the way Jupiter and Saturn were aligned. Astronomy played a role in life in the Middle Ages, and doctors thought that some gas released from the planets, because of the way they were positioned, was seeping through out atmosphere and getting through the skin of the infected humans. People of this time had no idea why this disease was spreading so rapidly.
8. Sources Lindberg, David C. Science in the Middle Ages. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1978. Print. I got this book from an Orange County Public Library in Rancho Santa Margarita.
