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In ancient times, the theory of medicine tended to explain illnesses with demons, curses, sins, and the occasional werewolf attack. With the discovery of germ theory, pharmacology, and sophisticated anti-werewolf technologies, such old-fashioned diagnoses are a thing of the past.
In some cases, however, the treatments and traditions that were first established are still in use today and serving more modern purposes. Grab your old-timey doctor-style headband reflector and use it to shine a light on these ten ancient medical practices that can still do good today.
ASPIRIN
A product of mankind's eternal compulsion to chew up bits of plants at random, acetylsalicyclic acid may be one of the world's oldest medicines, being first referenced on a Sumerian stone tablet from 2000 BCE.
Found in the bark of willow, myrtle, and poplar trees, aspirin appears in pre-scientific medicine in cultures all around the world as an analgesic and anti-inflammatory, and was first shaped into purified pill form in 1899 by German mega-pharmacist Bayer.
Those of you seeking an authentic old-fashioned acetylsalicyclic acid experience on the cheap need only cut some shavings from the living bark of an appropriate tree, let it simmer in boiling water for a few minutes, add sugar to taste, and reflect on how you just saved the $1.99 you might have paid for aspirin just by spending a half hour preparing and drinking some gross tree bark.
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CAUTERIZATION
The use of hot metal tools to sizzle shut arteries, incisions, and the occasional bloody stump was the state of the medical art from the age of Hippocrates to the early twentieth century.
The procedure only fell off in popularity after research showed that applying red-hot metal to the human body wasn't as great an idea as everyone thought it was. Long believed to prevent infection, it was shown that the tissue damage from cautery was so severe that it actually could spread infection to unrelated areas.
Cautery is still useful in certain limited applications, however, with chemical cautery often used to remove warts and electrocautery used to seal off incisions and wounds too small to effectively suture.
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INOCULATION
The idea of deliberately infecting someone with a weakened version of an otherwise deadly virus may have been present in Indian Ayurvedic literature as early as 1000 BCE, so it's a little unfair that late-comer Edward Jenner is known as "the father of immunology" after only developing a smallpox vaccine in 1796.
Chinese and Arabic medical texts from the 16th century make clear reference to an early and totally gross form of smallpox inoculation known as variolation, where scabs or pus from smallpox survivors would be rubbed into the open wounds of whoever needed protection from the disease.
The idea gradually spread to the backward nations of Europe, where Jenner and other pioneers of germ theory like Louis Pasteur hit upon the idea of using a dead, inactive form of the virus instead of the injured-but-still-feisty samples used in variolation.
This considerably safer method took the world by storm and is only now encountering significant resistance from people who are easily tricked and/or really look forward to rubbing pus into their open wounds.
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DOCTOR-PATIENT CONFIDENTIALITY
The trust between a physician and his or her patient is an important legal component of modern medicine and allows people to seek treatment for even the most embarrassing diseases in the confidence that the doctor won't turn around and blab to the cops, the press, or your mom.
The earliest traces of this confidentiality agreement are found in the ancient Ebers Papyrus of Egypt, specifically in the treatise's Book of Hearts; this part of the papyrus dealt specifically with mental disorders (like depression) where doctor-patient confidentiality is a major issue even today.
While most of the Ebers Papyrus' treatments have fallen out of favor (except for how to remove a guinea worm, where the Egyptian method is still used today) the ethical principles of doctor-patient relationships went on to form a major part of the Hippocratic method.
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CAESAREAN BIRTHS (C-SECTIONS)
Contrary to popular belief, Julius Caesar was probably not delivered by caesarean surgery, a theory based on the fact that his mother was reportedly alive for much of his life.
C-sections were originally performed almost exclusively on women who had died attempting to give birth, and the procedure is only named after Caesar because he passed legislation making it required by Roman law (instead of by religion and popular custom) for doctors to attempt the operation.
Cultures around the world have recorded tales of caesarean births dating back to 1000 BCE, but before the invention of antibiotics, sterile equipment, and anesthesia, the mothers' chances of surviving the procedure (if she was alive in the first place) were vanishingly small.
Today, the procedure is so refined and safe that some women choose to undergo c-sections for non-medical reasons.
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PHLEBOTOMY (BLOODLETTING)
For centuries, the dominant principle guiding medical practice was the idea of the four humors, liquids that would build up in the body and cause various disorders.
Blood was regarded as particularly troublesome, and the first treatment for many illnesses was getting rid of "excess" blood by opening an artery and draining it away. If you run into a doctor today who specializes in humor-based medicine, you should run away as soon as possible.
However, the techniques developed to find and open an artery with a minimum of danger to the patient are still in use today-and in some cases, there are real reasons to drain a certain amount of a patient's blood.
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LEECH THERAPY
One particularly effective medieval bloodletting technique was the use of leeches to drain off some of that pesky blood in a relatively clean and painless manner.
Leech-based medicine unknowingly benefited from certain handy substances in the leech's saliva: a mild anesthetic allowing the leech to nibble on patients without their knowledge, and a powerful anti-coagulant that prevented the small wound from healing up quickly.
The anti-coagulant (known as hirudin) has proven so difficult for modern science to replicate that the market for the European medical leech has found new life in microsurgery applications, where blood pooling and coagulation can threaten newly attached or repaired body parts.
Modern doctors can just grab a handy leech, pop it on near the surgical site, and be ensured of a healthy blood flow.
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MAGGOT THERAPY
What medical procedure could be less pleasant than allowing a slug-like invertebrate drink your blood for an hour or so? How about allowing a handful of fly larvae burrow in your wound so they can nibble away all the dead tissue?
Maggot debridement therapy is believed to go all the way back to the native populations of South American and Australia and has long been associated with military medicine.
For centuries, doctors tending to the recently chopped-up noted that wounded men with maggoty wounds tended to suffer less morbidity and necrosis than cases that were not swarming with horrible insects, and maggot therapy was extremely common in military hospitals all the way up through World War II.
The widespread use of penicillin lead to a general maggot cutback, patients generally preferring pills and powders to a handful of squirming bugs, but the rise of antibiotic-resistant strains lead to a sort of maggot renaissance as doctors sought to find ways to treat necrotic flesh without becoming more dependent on antibiotics.
Today, any doctor in the United States can prescribe maggot therapy, particularly if they want to really creep you out.
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DRILLING A GREAT BIG HOLE IN THE SKULL
The prehistoric surgical practice of trepanning/trephining/drilling a great big hole in the skull has few adherents today, but for most of medical history it was the go-to treatment for demonic possession.
Today, decompressive craniectomy is regarded as a last-resort treatment for uncontrollable brain swelling and is far more controversial today than its ancestor in its time. A major study by Australian surgeons seemed to show that drilling a great big hole in the skull was associated with worse recovery and functional outcomes than standard practice.
Other surgeons, however, found flaws in the study's methodology and pointed out that children with severe head injuries benefitted particularly well from having a great big hole drilled in their tiny damaged skulls.
The only concrete conclusion modern medicine has come to regarding the drilling of great big holes in the skull is that it is far less effective in treating demonic possession than once thought. Today, demons are typically driven out of the patient by antibiotic regimens and the sacrifice of goats.
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wikimedia commons10 of 10Next: 10 Weird Medical Cures
LUNACY
There are as many rumored statistical and medical correlations between full moons and weird behavior as there are studies proving that those correlations aren't possible, but nothing can seem to put the age-old connection between the moon and the mind to bed.
Theories and observations tying lunar phases to weirdness and health issues date back as far as the Babylonian empire, but the first concrete proof of a correlation between the human body and the big chunk of rock that occasionally orbits above it came just this month at Switzerland's University of Basel.
Sleep scientists used electroencephalographs and hormone analysis to show that people's sleep experience varied based on the phase of the moon-even when the test subjects had no way of seeing the moon or even keeping track of the lunar cycle.
Of course, correlation is no causation, and scientists still have no explanation that comes close to how the moon might be affecting human behavior, but ask any paramedic, trauma surgeon, or ER nurse: the crazies always come out for a full moon.
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