History of Campylobacter

Campylobacter species have been causing illness for several centuries although they were only recognised a shaman pathogens in the 1970’s.

Campylobacter species have long been associated with the cause of veterinary diseases such as diarrhoea and septic abortions in cattle and sheep. It was first identified in the fecal tissue of aborted sheep in 1913, but was not isolated from stool samples of patients with diarrhoea until 1972.

The first observation of Campylobacter organism may have been as early as 1886 by Theodor Escherich, who described spiral organisms in the large intestine of children who had died of diarrhoea disease, and he called it ‘cholera infantum’.

Later Smith and Taylor described the vibrionic abortion in cattle and named the agent Vibrionic fetus. The association of V. fetes with enteric disease was first reported by Elizabeth King in 1957, and she preferred to name as ‘related vibrios’. In 1959, Florent showed that a form of the infection known bovine infections infertility was caused by V. fetes transmitted from carrier bulls to cows during coitus.

The genus name Campylobacter a Greek word for ‘curved rod’ was eventually proposed by Sebald and Veron (1963) to include microaerophilic bacteria that were different form Vibrio cholera and other species of vision in a number of respects.

In 1970s Campylobacter was successfully isolated from the stools of humans with accurate enter colitis. The isolation of Campylobacter from feces was accomplished in 1968 and published in 1972.
History of Campylobacter

A Course of Treatment by Egyptian Doctors in 1300 BC

A Course of Treatment by Egyptian Doctors in 1300 BC
Egyptian doctors were well aware of their limitations, however, and were told not to inflict unnecessary suffering on their patients, so there were many case where they had to say at least – ‘An ailment not to be treated’. They were recommended to take note of the treatments and medicines they used and of their effects, so that they had a record for similar cases in the future.

There were medicines to be taken internally, other to be applied to the outside of the body, and others still to be inhaled. Egyptian ingredients that can be identified today appear to be sound herbal remedies. However, some medicines had ingredients such as mice, beetles and dung, which aimed to drive out the demons causing the illness.

The Egyptians had a remarkable knowledge of the way the body worked, and knew about its internal arrangements through mummifying the dead. For them, the heart was the most important organ; they new that it pumped blood round the body, and that the pulse ‘spoke the messages of the heart’. They also knew that injuries to one side of the brain affected the opposite side of the body.

Doctors sometimes used surgery as well as medicine to treat patients, and opened injured skulls to relieve pressure in the brain. Before an operation the surgeon gave his patient a drink, presumably a painkiller, ‘to render it agreeable’. In the New Kingdom the painkiller might have been opium, imported from Cyprus. Because of the importance the Egyptians attached to ritual purity the surgeon and his assistants washed themselves and purified the instruments in fire before the operation. Both of these would cut down the risk of infection.

The Egyptians were a deeply religious people and prayers would always be used as well as medicines, even for the simplest ailments. In difficult cases, magic might be employed. It was also possible to visit temple of a deity associated with medicine, such as Imhotep, which had priests trained as a doctors. At some temples the sick could spend a night close to the god’s sanctuary. During such stay, called ‘incubation’, the patient might be cured by the deity, or dream of the god and receive instructions for treatment. Even if no help was forth coming, the sufferer was spiritually comforted.
A Course of Treatment by Egyptian Doctors in 1300 BC

Biography of Hippocrates

Biography of Hippocrates
Hippocrates is referred to ‘father of medicine’ in recognition of his lasting contributions to the field as the founder of the Hippocratic school of medicine.

Hippocrates was born to Heraclides, a physician and Praxitela, daughter of Phenaretis in year of 460 BC on the Greek island of Cos. He learned medicine from his own father and grandfather.

He also studied other subject with Democritus the Abderite and Gorgias of Leontini. Democritus was famous Greek materialist philosopher while Gorgias was famous philosopher and rhetorician at that time.

Hippocrates also trained at asklepieion (healing temple) of Kos and took lessons from Thracian physician Herodicus of Selymbria. Herodicus was Greek physician famous as the first person use of therapeutic exercise for treatment of disease and maintenance of health. Herodicus was described as gymnastic master.

Hippocrates later became a famous physician and teacher of medicine. He was regarded as the greatest physician of his time. He based his medical practice on observations and on the study of the human body.

He held the belief that illness had a physical and a rational explanation. Hippocrates held a belief that the body must be treated as a whole and not just a series of parts. Hippocrates was the first to give the physician an independent standing, separate from the cosmological speculator, or nature philosopher. Hippocrates confined the medical man to medicine.

He soon developed an Oath of Medical Ethics for physician. He died in 377 BC at the age of 90 years old. Some says at the age of 83 or 106 years He lies buried between Gyrton and Larissa.
Biography of Hippocrates