History of Medicine

Pandemic probably tops the long list of new words added to our vocabulary in 2020, but before it earned that notoriety, covid-19 was classified as an epidemic in Wuhan, China. It was only in March 2020 that WHO upgraded it to a pandemic -- far deadlier and more widespread than an epidemic. What's in a name, you ask? Merriam Webster defines an epidemic as a disease affecting a large number of individuals within a population, community, or region at the same time;  a pandemic is an epidemic occurring worldwide, or over a very wide area, crossing international boundaries and usually affecting a large number of people, according to the WHO. Not surprisingly, both words are derived from ancient Greek. Pandemic comes from the Greek word pandemos , based on pan meaning "all" + demos meaning "people" or "population"; pandemic therefore affects nearly all of the people. In contrast, epi means "upon," so epidemic is something visited upon the people. 

Although we have come to associate COVID-19 with many negatives-  school closures,   quarantine, social distancing, and travel restrictions to name a few- it has also provided a boost for science, particularly in the area of vaccine research. The pandemic of historical proportions has triggered a global race to develop a vaccine against the virus. The development of a new vaccine typically takes 10-15 years, a luxury the world can ill afford right now. So companies around the world are racing to find a solution in record time. This has led to the development of an entirely new type of vaccine called mRNA or messenger RNA vaccine. mRNA vaccines are not a new concept; they have been known for a few decades but have not been developed seriously until now. mRNAs are tiny pieces of genetic code that tell cells in our bodies to make a protein.  The two companies at the forefront of vaccine development, Pfizer and Moderna, are both using mRNAs to develop a vaccine. They both use synthetic mRN

Today's news about Pfizer's coronavirus vaccination brings hope for an end to the covid-19 pandemic. With an effective vaccine (90% effective as Pfizer has claimed for their vaccine is truly spectacular!), we can finally think about returning to life as before- normal school, yay! (never thought I would say that ever!), even though it will be months or years before a sufficiently large population can be given the vaccine. Nevertheless, it is exciting news for people, as well as for the scientific community that a new vaccine was developed in such an unprecedented short time. In honor of Pfizer's announcement today, I decided to update an older post about vaccines and their history.   A vaccine protects a person from becoming sick when exposed to the virus. How exactly does that happen? When a person gets infected by a virus (any type of virus in general), the white blood cells in their body produces antibodies to fight the virus which helps them recover, and these antibodi

As I ponder a career in medicine, I have started researching colleges with good medical programs, which made me curious about medical schools in the past. Although the art of medicine was widely practiced in ancient civilizations, it wasn't really taught as a science until much later. It was only during the Classical period that medical schools started being established as a formal place to study the science of medicine.  The first known medical school was built in Alexandria around 311 BCE in modern-day Egypt (which was controlled by the Greeks at the time). However, Pergamum (where Hippocrates practiced) is rumored to have had a medical school earlier than that but there is very little known about this school, so the first medical school is credited to Alexandria. The Greeks were always stronger in medicine than the Romans, and Alexandria was certainly proof of that! What is also impressive is that Alexandria School of Medicine united all the different medical doctrines including

Symbol of the discipline of pharmacy After prescriptions, I decided to explore the history of pharmacy. Pharmacy is defined as “the art of preparing and dispensing drugs or a place where drugs are sold.” The word itself originates from the Greek word for remedy, pharmakon . However, the concept of a drug store where a pharmacist makes and dispenses medicine didn't exist in ancient Greece, but came much later- back in the ancient times, priests and doctors acted as the pharmacist, combining different ingredients as medicine for patients. This process, called compounding, is now done at the pharmacy. Although drug stores did not exist back in ancient times, doctors and priests were history’s first pharmacists as they practiced the art of pharmacy.  During the Egyptian civilizations, they mostly worked in temples or palaces, making medicines or personal luxury goods for priests and the royalty. In the Classical world, the best-known pharmacist was the Greek Diocles of Carystus, who wa

So we know that the Rx symbol used in prescriptions originated in the ancient world, but how and when exactly did the process of writing prescriptions start? The concept of a doctor writing a prescription followed by a pharmacist filling it is a modern concept. In ancient times, the doctor would provide the medicine to the patient, and before doctors, it was the priests who made up concoctions by mixing different ingredients. But slowly the act of compounding medicines became a specialty, and the doctor's job was restricted to prescribing it and sending the patient to a compounder or pharmacist to get it made. Although the exact origin of this practice is murky, the practice of preparation and dispensation of drugs certainly existed for thousands of years, dating all the way back to the oldest of civilizations: the Sumerian and Egyptian civilizations. The world’s first recorded prescription is thought to be a clay tablet in Mesopotamia dated ~2500 BCE which lists 15 prescriptions

Have you ever wondered why medicines are denoted with an ℞ or Rx symbol? There are actually many theories about its origin but the most common one is that the symbol for prescriptions originated from the "Eye of Horus", which was an ancient Egyptian symbol associated with healing powers. According to Egyptian mythology, Horus lost his eye in battle but his mom used her powers to restore his eye, hence it became a symbol of healing.  Eye of Horus In the 2 nd century, Greek physician Galen adapted this symbol to impress his patients. Galen’s influence on medicine was so strong that even the symbol was borrowed through the centuries and it eventually evolved into the modern symbol Rx (the eye of Horus kinda looks like an Rx). Other theories place its origin in Latin and Roman times. One theory is that Rx was used as an abbreviation of the Latin word recipere , meaning “to prepare,” which physicians wrote on medical prescriptions. Yet another theory points to the similarity of