Heath and Medicine in the Middle Ages

Modern medicine is a result of many years of experimenting and analysing treatments to prove that they are safe and beneficial to humans. However, without the experiences of Middle Age Medicine, Modern Medicine would not have evolved into the safe, reliable treatments we have today. Many people died in the Middle Ages as a result of a lack of evidence based practices and medicines that have since been developed because of experiences learnt.

Life before antibiotics and the discovery of germs, meant disease was constant. Some infections lead to death as a result of poor hygiene and living conditions. Many infections today are treated with antibiotics, and germs have been controlled with antiseptic products. People today have been educated on the need for clean living conditions and correct storage of food for example, to prevent these diseases.

The Black Death was a disease that killed nearly one third of the people in England. Polio was a virus that caused major deformities in unborn babies and often led to a shorter life as a result. Other diseases were the mumps which caused painful swelling and had symptoms of the flu and often led to infertility. There was also the measles. This was a skin rash that could be spread through body fluids that was dangerous too pregnant woman. Some of the diseases still occur today, and are as dangerous, but are controlled through immunisations. These immunisations are tried and tested in controlled situations that allow their use on humans as safe as possible. This is made possible with knowledge gained through many years of experience.

Child birth in the Middle Ages was considered deadly. When a woman was pregnant, she was told by the church to prepare her shrouds and confess her sins in case of death. The woman would often bleed to death while giving birth. Today this rarely happens. We have access to modern day technology and educated, experienced professionals to keep everything on track during pre and post pregnancy.

On the whole, modern day health and medicine is proven to be more trusted and reliable than medicine used in The Middle Ages. However, without all the mess-ups that people in the Middle Ages made, we today would not have been able to build from those mistakes to make health care Safe and effective.