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Today In Health History Headlines
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Down syndrome has been around for many centuries but was misinterpreted as a mental disability.
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Fear of surgery and the pain associated with the surgeon’s knife has long been an issue for patients.
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One of the most respected physicians of the 17th century, Thomas Sydenham, completed his tome, "Schedula Monitoria de Novae Febris Ingressa," more than 300 years ago today, summing up all he knew about disease.
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This week marks the birth of an early kidney expert. Richard Bright, born Sept. 28, 1789, published a study of kidney disease in 1827 that has been called "a masterpiece of clinical literature."
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The Feast of Saints Cosmas and Damien, held this week honors the first saints who were called upon specifically to heal disease.
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When Paracelsus became a medical professor at the University of Basel, his first assignment was to burn medical books written by Galen and Avicenna.
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Proof that disease could be caused by parasites and fungi was recorded as far back as the 16th century, but discoveries of microscopic organisms were not readily accepted for at least another 100 years.
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“The key to every biological problem must finally be sought in the cell,” said Edmund Beecher Wilson, the man who taught the first biology course in this country.
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Earle Dickson invented the Band-Aid on this date in 1921. Dickson, who was a cotton buyer for Johnson & Johnson, was newly married at the time.
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In 1948, Edward Kendall and Philip Hench created the first of the many “miracle drugs," which were actually synthesized hormones, to treat rheumatoid arthritis and other diseases.
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The first national scientific society in the United States was the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), referred to by one of its early members as "the great mother organization" of learning.
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One of the most prestigious medical colleges in the country was founded more than 200 years ago today, and doors opened two months later. Harvard Medical School was founded in 1782 as the Medical Institution of Harvard College in Cambridge, Mass.
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The latter part of the 19th century was a risky time to be a child in America. Infant mortality stood at about 200 per 1,000 births, a serious form of diarrhea killed thousands of babies each year, and epidemics of scarlet fever, diphtheria and other diseases ran rampant.
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Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, a 17th century draper’s apprentice, used lenses to examine the threads of fabrics he was working with.
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Ella Phillips Crandall was a leader in public health nursing who spent much of her career battling disease, filth and poverty in American city slums.
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Researchers spent much of the 19th century looking for various ways to mask the pain of surgery. In addition to ether, chloroform and nitrous oxide, one promising substance late in the century was cocaine (thanks in part to research by Dr. Sigmund Freud.)
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Ivan Pavlov, Russian physiologist and experimental psychologist, is usually associated with his most famous work, conditioned reflexes.
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After receiving a medical degree from the Bellevue Hospital Medical College in New York City, Walter Reed went to work for the boards of health of New York City and Brooklyn.
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On this date in 1916, physicians Joseph Goldberger and G.A. Wheeler produced pellagra, a nutritional disorder characterized by skin lesions, gastrointestinal and neurological disturbances, in prisoners at a prison farm in rural Mississippi.
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The first artificial aortic valve was successfully fitted on a 30-year-old patient on this date in 1952.
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