Health and the People in Britain, c1000 to the Present Day

What Health and the People in Britain, c1000 to the Present Day covers

Health and the People in Britain, c1000 to the Present Day is examined in Paper 2, Shaping the nation. It covers the factors that shape this study, medieval medicine, medical progress, public health in the Middle Ages, the impact of the Renaissance on Britain, dealing with disease, Prevention of disease, the development of Germ Theory and its impact on the treatment of disease in Britain, A revolution in surgery, Improvements in public health, modern treatment of disease, the impact of war and technology on surgery and modern public health.

The 13 subtopics

Each one has its own page.

• The factors that shape this studyHow war, religion and superstition, chance, government, communication, science and technology, and individuals such as Galen and Fleming have helped or held back the progress of British medicine and public health from the Middle Ages to the present day.Open →
• Medieval medicineThe Four Humours and Galen's Theory of Opposites, supernatural explanations and miasma, how physicians were trained and diagnosed illness, bleeding and purging, the barber-surgeons, apothecaries and wise women who treated the poor, herbal remedies, and why medicine changed so little.Open →
• Medical progressHow the Church both helped the sick and held back medicine, the purpose of medieval hospitals such as St Bartholomew's, the Islamic medicine of Avicenna, Rhazes and Albucasis, and medieval surgery, including pain relief, cautery and the work of John of Arderne.Open →
• Public health in the Middle AgesWhy medieval towns were unhealthy, rakers, why monasteries were healthier, the Black Death of 1348 and its believed and real causes, treatments and flagellants, how towns kept plague out, and the Statute of Cambridge.Open →
• The impact of the Renaissance on BritainWhat the Renaissance was, why dissection became more common, Vesalius and the errors of Galen he corrected, Paré's wound dressings and ligatures, Harvey's proof of the circulation, the opposition all three met, and why their discoveries brought patients so little benefit at the time.Open →
• Dealing with diseaseThe survival of bleeding and purging, cinchona bark, Culpeper's herbal, quackery, London's plague of 1665 and its searchers and plague doctors, the voluntary hospitals and dispensaries, the rise of the surgeons, and John Hunter.Open →
• Prevention of diseaseThe dangers of smallpox, inoculation and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, its drawbacks, Jenner's cowpox experiment of 1796 and vaccination, the opposition it met, Parliament's grants and compulsory vaccination from 1853, and the eradication of smallpox in 1980.Open →
• The development of Germ Theory and its impact on the treatment of disease in BritainSpontaneous generation, Pasteur's proof of 1861 and pasteurisation, why treatment did not change at once, Koch's microbes and methods, the chicken cholera accident and Pasteur's vaccines, Ehrlich's magic bullet and Salvarsan 606, and patent medicines.Open →
• A revolution in surgeryPain, infection and bleeding, nitrous oxide and ether, Simpson's chloroform and the objections to it, Queen Victoria's approval, the black period of surgery, Lister's carbolic acid and its results, resistance to it, and aseptic surgery.Open →
• Improvements in public healthLiving conditions in the industrial towns, cholera and how it spreads, John Snow and the Broad Street pump, Chadwick's report of 1842 and the resistance to it, the Public Health Acts of 1848 and 1875, the Great Stink and Bazalgette's sewers, and why attitudes changed.Open →
• Modern treatment of diseaseFleming's discovery of penicillin and why it stalled, Florey and Chain's work and mass production in the Second World War, the growth of the drug industry, the thalidomide tragedy, antibiotic resistance and MRSA, HIV and AIDS, and the appeal of alternative treatments.Open →
• The impact of war and technology on surgeryHarold Gillies and the tubed pedicle, Archibald McIndoe and the Guinea Pig Club, blood groups, stored blood and the national transfusion service, X-rays at the front, the first kidney and heart transplants and the problem of rejection, and modern keyhole, laser and radiation techniques.Open →
• Modern public healthBooth's and Rowntree's poverty surveys and the Boer War recruits, the Liberal reforms and their limits, what the two world wars did to health and housing, from homes fit for heroes and the 1919 Housing Act to prefabs and new towns, Beveridge, the NHS and twenty-first-century pressures.Open →

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Take Health and the People in Britain, c1000 to the Present Day further

The same content, four other ways.

Commonly confused

Pairs that lose marks when they are blurred together.

• Inoculation vs Vaccination

  Inoculation: giving a mild dose of smallpox by scratching matter from a sore into a cut. Vaccination: Jenner's method of using cowpox matter to protect a person against smallpox.

• Antiseptic surgery vs Aseptic surgery

  Antiseptic surgery: killing germs in the wound with carbolic acid sprays and soaked dressings. Aseptic surgery: keeping germs out of the wound with sterilised instruments, gowns, masks and gloves.

• Pasteur vs Koch

  Pasteur: scientist who proved microbes in the air cause decay and made vaccines for anthrax and rabies. Koch: scientist who isolated the individual microbes behind anthrax, tuberculosis and cholera.

Questions from this topic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1. 1

   In what two opposite ways has warfare affected medicine over the last thousand years?

   Model answer

   It has drained money, doctors and hospitals away from civilian care, yet the sheer number of casualties has forced rapid progress in surgery, transfusion and the control of infection.

2. 2

   Name two advances that were pushed forward by the fighting of the twentieth century.

   Model answer

   The rebuilding of shattered faces by plastic surgeons, and the collecting and storing of blood so that the wounded could be transfused near the front.

3. 3

   How did wartime at home push British governments into improving people's health?

   Model answer

   The poor condition of recruits and of evacuated children exposed how badly the poor were living, and a government that had asked for sacrifice found it hard to refuse reform afterwards.

4. 4

   Why did the medieval Church slow the growth of medical knowledge?

   Model answer

   It taught that illness was sent by God, discouraged the cutting up of bodies, and treated the ancient texts it approved of as beyond question, so a new idea looked like heresy.

5. 5

   In what ways did religion help the sick before the state took any responsibility for them?

   Model answer

   Religious houses founded and staffed hospitals, fed and nursed the poor, and copied out medical texts that would otherwise have been lost.

6. 6

   Give an example of a superstitious explanation of disease and the harm it did.

   Model answer

   Blaming plague on God's anger or on the alignment of the planets led people to whip themselves or process through the streets instead of looking for a physical cause.

What is inside Levo

Six ways to work the same material.

Health and the People in Britain, c1000 to the Present Day revision questions

What does Health and the People in Britain, c1000 to the Present Day cover in AQA GCSE History?

13 subtopics: the factors that shape this study, medieval medicine, medical progress, public health in the middle ages, the impact of the renaissance on britain, dealing with disease, prevention of disease, the development of germ theory and its impact on the treatment of disease in britain, a revolution in surgery, improvements in public health, modern treatment of disease, the impact of war and technology on surgery and modern public health. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.

How is Health and the People in Britain, c1000 to the Present Day organised?

By the AQA 8145 specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.