Old Vs. New Medical Remedies

By: Therese Ptak

 

I’m so grateful to have had the benefit of modern medical training. We’ve been able to learn so much about the human body and as a result we can do more to save lives like the development of (CPR) and other medical marvels like antibiotics, laparoscopic surgery and MRI. More importantly, we’ve learned to empower regular people to save lives on their own with (CPR) and BLS (certification) courses.  Historically, this wasn’t always the case. Before anyone had even conceived of the possibility of (CPR) or a first aid (certification) program, most people depended on medical professionals or folk remedies to cure their bodily ills. With the limited knowledge of how the body worked many of the accepted methods of healing ranged from weird to incredibly dangerous. The standards of care were also much different, modern medical school requires (certification) in a variety of areas, passing MCATs and licensing exams. In the past, these standards weren’t always so high and optimal medical hygiene standards were not always upheld. It makes me shiver to think about it, and glad that now we have the benefit of modern science but let’s compare some old methods to modern standards of care.

 

Thought to Cure:  A variety of ills including bad body odor.

Yes. Urine Therapy. Drinking and bathing in your own urine was recommended as a path to increased wellness, and a form of replenishing and refreshing your body.  People were recommended to soak their skin in it, even administer urine enemas to help purify the body.

Modern Solution: Unfortunately, urine therapy still exists but there is ZERO evidence of its effectiveness and it certainly doesn’t solve the bad body odor issue. If you want to feel refreshed and smell nice try a shower…with real water…and a nice floral soap.

 

Thought to Cure: Anxiety, Depression, Schizophrenia

If you really want to scare yourself you’ll pick up any book on the history of psychiatric care. There is a wealth of old psychiatric treatment methods there guaranteed to make any modern health professional cringe, but the lobotomy is one of the most frightening.  Imagine lying on your back and having a doctor pull your eye lid back and insert an ice pick probe through your eye to sever bits of the nerves of the frontal lobe of your brain. It produced a calm sort of indifference in patients that had previously been agitated and so the practice was deemed a success. Eventually people realized that cutting things in the brain without knowing exactly what you were snipping was probably a bad idea. Especially when patients seemed to lose parts of their personality, and serious long term side effects were discovered.

Modern Solution: Psychiatric therapy practices have come a long way. Patients now have access to anti-depressants and other forms of drug therapy. Additionally we use non chemical interventions as well like teaching coping mechanisms with one-on-one or group therapy sessions. No more poking around in the brain with sharp surgical tools.

 

Thought to Cure: Everything.

Initially developed by the ancient Greeks, bloodletting was one of those bad ideas that just hung around until the 19th century.  It was thought that a person suffering from illness had an imbalance of the humors (blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm) these humors also determined your personality (it’s where we get the term “hot-blooded” for someone with anger issues).  When thrown out of balance it meant you had too much of one of these humors and the only thing that could be done to fix it was to cut into you and bleed you out, sometimes as much as 4 quarts of your blood…y’know, depending on how sick you were.

Modern Solution: While bloodletting itself is laughable, and the concept of humors well…humorous, to say the least, they weren’t as far off the mark as they thought. Blood does hold the key to properly diagnosing certain diseases so modern medicine uses blood samples as a diagnostic tool in finding infections, determining pregnancy, confirming clotting disorders and many other medical tests. 

 

Thought to Cure: Headaches, Migraines, and Seizures

Trepanation is probably one of the most unpleasant and ancient medical practices dating back to the prehistoric era. It involves drilling holes into your skull to eliminate your headaches, migraines or seizures (though for the life of me I can’t understand how that would do anything but increase the very problem you were trying to solve but whatever).

Modern Solution:  There are a number of natural and drug therapies available to assist with making your headaches or migraines disappear and NONE of them involve bringing a drill bit anywhere near your skull. Similarly, seizure care has grown much more advanced with drug therapy to help regulate it or even certain surgeries that can mitigate or eliminate them (but they won’t leave holes in your head, I promise).