Not just another Plague Documentary …
This is the story of Eyam, a village that sacrificed itself for the sake of others during a plague outbreak in 1665. It is one which is filled with suffering, with pain, with death; however, it is also one which is filled with love, with compassion, and with hope. Few people know about Eyam. Big […]
The Chirurgeon’s Apprentice in New Scientist
‘WHEN King Charles II suffered a sudden seizure on the morning of 2 February 1685, his personal physician had just the remedy. He quickly slashed open a vein in the king’s left arm and filled a basin with the royal blood.’ Read more in this week’s issue of New Scientist (17 November 2012) – out […]
Extraordinary Women: A Personal Look at Breast Cancer
I am sitting here in the surgical waiting room at Northwest Community Hospital, just outside of Chicago. Florescent lights hum overhead while visitors flip casually through month-old magazines. At one point, a group of tittering young women breeze by clutching congratulatory balloons on their way to the maternity ward. The clock ticks in the background, […]
Medicine’s Dark Secrets: A Trailer
Ever since starting The Chirurgeon’s Apprentice, my life has gotten strange. I know what you are thinking—how much stranger can it get when you spend every waking minute reading and writing about the horrible ways in which people in the past succumbed to death? Well, let me tell you… Six months ago, I was approached […]
Losing One’s Head: A Frustrating Search for the ‘Truth’ about Decapitation
If you ever find yourself in a pub with me, chances are that at some point, the conversation will turn to death. Not just death, but the terrifying and horrible ways people have succumbed to it in the past. I have often heard a story retold about a man who attended the execution of his […]
O, Wandering Womb! Where Art Thou?
Hysteria. The word conjures up an array of images, none of which probably include a nomadic uterus wandering aimlessly around the female body. Yet up until the 18th century, that is precisely what medical practitioners believed was the cause behind this mysterious disorder. Today, hysteria is regarded as a ‘physical expression of a mental conflict’ […]
The Hunter Hunted: Searching for the Body of an Anatomist
Standing in the middle of the Crystal Gallery in the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons, my mind begins to wander to the hundreds of lives contained in these glass jars and to the man who dissected their bodies. John Hunter. His name seems acutely appropriate, for he was a hunter of sorts: […]
WARNING: TOXIC! The Deadly Dead
When a person thinks of anatomical specimens from the past, he or she may think of disembodied remains floating in glass jars filled with alcohol. The Hunterian Collection at the Royal College of Surgeons in London is full of such specimens—unborn foetuses suspended in time as if still incubating in the womb; a hand, puffy […]
The Chirurgeon’s Apprentice in Wellcome History
‘When people first discover that I am a historian of medicine, they often falter as they try to process this information. Most of the time, the response is: “That’s a real job?” It is an innocent reaction, not intended to be insulting, and is usually followed by a barrage of questions about my research. What […]
The Rotten Tooth: A Brief History of Dentistry
The sharp pinch of a large needle piercing the tender flesh inside the mouth. The high-pitched sound of a drill shattering tooth enamel. The metallic taste of blood. The smell of antiseptics. The loss of sensation in the lips, tongue, and cheek. The swelling, the bruising, the pain. For many, there is nothing to be […]