How Have Surgery Changed Over Time

During the Renaissance individuals were taught about medicine and how to perform surgeries, people who were

Christianity played a huge part in the medicine of Europe at that time (the reason flagellation was used), so prayer itself was also a common cure-all, along with holy artefacts and other holy things. People were also not permitted to perform dissection on cadavers, making it difficult if not impossible for medicine to progress. This meant that it stayed

Doctors based most anatomical descriptions on the work of Galen and Hippocrates, as cutting into and exploring a dead body was strictly prohibited by the Catholic church. Doctors estimated that perhaps the health of a person relied on their sleep, exercise, diet, air intake and emotions, as well as the position of the stars. Unfortunately for peasants, doctors were hard to find. Most medical advice for the lower classes came from the elders with folk traditions. Alternatively, the towns people would turn to the local church and pray the illness away. The spread of disease was sped up by the lack of knowledge of germs, meaning going to the church to pray away the disease made the spread of it much more serious.

I. INTRODUCTION- Did you know about 234 million major surgeries are performed each year? Today surgeries are top notch and can fix almost anything, whether it is fixing a broken nose or a heart transplant. Although, where did surgery start out and how did it affect life? In The History of Philosophy: A Short Survey by James Fieser, Fieser explains how a couple of brilliant minds paved the way for a surgery and medicine take over the world. Before the Renaissance, everything was based on religion or god. Once people started to prove religion wrong with science the world was flipped upside down. Surgery in the Renaissance destroyed religion, because everything went from theory to fact.

Before the Industrial Revolution, the process of surgery was an unpleasant experience for the lives of many patients. It was rare that surgery was scheduled in advance and was only done in a “last and desperate resort”(Neurosurgical Service 1996). Historical surgical procedures could be seen as being barbaric today with going far back to Ancient Greece of cutting off the limb or drilling into the head to “rid the body of spirits” without any pain killer at all(Hartford Stage). This also becomes apparent in medieval ages in which most surgeons were also barbers and take care of soldiers by performing bloodletting. When the scientific revolution happened the studying of our anatomy allowed scientists to create ways of how to nullify the pain

Surgery during the Middle Age had been passed down from early Greek societies. Galen named one of the famed physician was the first to incorporate dissections into the practice and open up a new window of medical advancements. His earliest influence on the fronts of Europe with his renowned studies in anatomy and physiology. Because of the increases interest in the field of medicine, across Western Europe more focus was brought to universities. Two of the more popular schools of medicine erected in the 13th century were the universities of Padua and Bologna. These schools both specialized in medicine and student took years of hard study to earn their

Prior to the enlightenment and scientific revolution, knowledge of medicine in Europe was extremely limited. Medical aid consisted of several separate professions from surgeons and barbers, to physicians, apothecaries, and faith healers. Up until the beginning of this era, faith healings were common practice across Europe, many believing that evil spirits were the source of disease, to be cured via exorcism. Apothecaries, who sold herbs, medicines, and drugs, were also common in European cities. During the Middle-Ages, physicians and surgeons become more significant in European life. One of the earlier practices, blood-letting was a common practice by physicians as a cure for many diseases. Surgeons operated without anesthesia, resulting in the death of many patients from sheer pain. An understanding of bacteria and infections was absent, resulting in many deaths during surgery.

Hospitals have been discovered from as early as 4000 BCE. These hospitals were more of “last resort” facilities; reserved for those dying or who had an infectious disease. They were more focused on caring for the patient instead of trying to heal them. Hospitals were mainly established by religious organizations and were staffed more with monks and nuns than professional doctors. At the end of the Middle Age, hospitals moved away from religious institutions to charity driven facilities. By the 1800’s advancements in technology and science changed hospitals and the staff to more professional doctors and nurses focusing on surgical procedures (Hospitals, 2017).

Surgical implications can end a patient's life, but the ability of a surgeon to remove and treat those implications is worth inspiring. It is reassuring to see the team work in close coordination and harmony in the operation theatre. What really fascinates one towards this field is the ability of a surgeon to fix a problem with one's own hands with precision, nicety and in a skilled manner.

In this episode, the primary issue is two doctors with differing opinions about how a surgery should be performed. An aging surgeon, Dr. Campbell, continues to use an outdated surgery and makes a major surgical mistake. A man who had his spleen removed has a huge infection because, as the younger Dr. Yang believes, the surgery was old school and poorly done.

Before the 1900s, our medical equipment was insufficient. We did not have the medicines and the machines back then as we do now in the 21st Century. In the past, medics and clerics only had the necessary instruments including items like cloth to patch up wounds and saws to amputate limbs. During that time, many people died from their injuries or the infection afterward because of the lack of good instruments. Now with the use of better equipment, doctors can assess patients and use said equipment to save patients' lives.

The hospital system throughout early medieval Europe was heavily dependent upon the Catholic Church and the monasteries. Hospitals throughout early medieval Europe started as house sized additions to monasteries, and held relatively few sick people. The hospitals at the monasteries were staffed by monks and supplied with herbs for treatment from the medical gardens at the monasteries. These small house sized hospitals were insignificant in comparison with the hospital in the Middle East at the time. The European hospitals did not become larger hubs for patient care or more efficient in the care they provided until the crusades.

and Ferraris V. 1997). From the school of Salerno came many rich texts about women surgeons, which for that time was unheard of their contributions were not limited to: textbooks of anatomy, training for physicians, the first textbook about women’s medicine and the first female medical school faculty member named Trotula de Ruggiero (Ferraris Z. & Ferraris V. 1997). For this school was not something to be mocked, “physicians trained at Salerno gained considerable prestige and notoriety throughout southern Europe” (Ferraris Z. & Ferraris V. 1997). The school of Salerno was not only progressive in its gendering of the profession but also, “produced original anatomic texts, huge collections of drug remedies based largely on well-known Arabic pharmacopeia, and one the most preeminent medical school faculties of its time” (Ferraris Z. & Ferraris V. 1997).

Surgery is one of the most groundbreaking medical advancements of all time and it is an ever expanding and learning field. A surgeon is one of the most highly paid professions, with an annual income minimum of $260,000 and $412,000 maximum, according to CNN money. Not only is it a great profession but, it is always growing and advancing. It started in a very simple form of just cutting someone open to relive immense pain, and has grown to include surgeries just for personal desires. Since it is constantly expanding, one can only imagine how far it will go and what surgery will be able to do one day.

As ideas progressed, abnormal remedies and methods defined the middle ages. Europeans used many unusual objects for remedies such as pigeon dung and boar penis (Reff). Healers used herbs and plants as well as charms to treat wounds (Pirotta 19). Those who couldn’t afford surgeons would have to hire barbers to do their operations. Diseases such as smallpox, measles, and the flu dominated Europe and were a big part of medical history. Treatment for these weren’t developed yet so this let to many deaths. The only way really people survived this was by having a genetic trait (Reff). Medicine careers and opportunities improved throughout the middle ages. About every village or community in Europe was likely to have a person with medical knowledge and plant knowledge. This is different to the ancient times where there were few healers, and everyone believed that the gods were causing disease and illness. European medicine, studied and practices by university trained doctors or town wives, was still in a primitive stage. Doctors would often prescribe blood draining for medical issues. The idea being that they were releasing excess fluid from the body, restoring balance (Reff).