Medicine Through the Millennia
Medicine and history are two fingers on the same hand. They
have been companion forces though bloody battles, treacherous travels and expansive
exhibitions. There isn’t a part of history that isn’t coupled with medicine, and
there is not a section of medicine that doesn’t have history. Since the world
began people have been in need of healing. Sadly throughout history and even
today we don’t know everything about medicine and there are still many things
that we cannot heal. It stands out to me that in history most of the miracles
Christ preformed had to do with healing. He was the master of healing.
The first recorded history of operation room nursing was in 2667 - 2648 BCE with the first recorded surgery and surgeon Imhotep. Surprisingly
many of his surgeries were successful. The ancient Greeks were also very
concerned with health and became the fathers of modern medicine. Many of the
words we use today are derived from ancient Greece. (find this information here)
The history of nursing becomes more specific as we look back
on the strides that the health field has made within the last 200 years. During
earlier European wars men were assigned to be medics. These medics would put
their lives on the line trying to help save their injured friends. At times it
didn’t matter if the injured were brothers or enemies they would help them none
the less. This shows the empathy that is important in the nursing field. They not
only helped heal their friends but also those they were trying to kill.
Soon women wanted to help in the war efforts and took on the
role of nurses. Many woman like Florence Nightingale were not paid for their services but instead served out of a strong desire to help. According to a Krystal McCort (an licensed nurse with about 7 years experience) nursing went from a mostly male dominated field to a nearly entirely female dominated field in the early 1900's and now it is making a change towards a more equal ratio with men on the rise. Today more than half of masters degrees in nursing are held by men (Krystal McCort). None the less, many of the associates degrees and bachelors degrees in nursing are held primarily by women. Despite the slow change in equality among the nursing sexes history is being made day by day
as nurses assist in the discovery and carrying out of new medical procedures
that literally change lives one patient at a time.
Works cited
"Medicine." Ancient History Encyclopedia. 5 Aug. 2011. Web. 13 Nov. 2015.
Very informative. I find it fascinating that medics would treat those on both sides of the battle. Obviously warfare has changed drastically since then, but I wonder how many medics would do that today. Maybe if more people knew that their perspective on war would change (for better or worse).
ReplyDeleteIt's incredible to think that successful surgeries could have been performed so many thousand years ago. Technology today makes so much possible in medicine, but these ancient doctors and nurses had to use what they had on hand: their hands.
ReplyDeleteLaycee, I love how you brought up Christ's healing miracles. Those stories have lasted for forever! That information about ancient OR nursing was really cool too. It's amazing how we have progressed, and how we've always seen that progression as important.
ReplyDeleteI love that you brought up how Christ really was a healer and in a way a nurse for the sick. You brought up "healing" a lot; I think nursing has a lot more to do with healing a person rather than what it seems to be today, which is often prescribing drugs to numb us rather than really heal us.
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