Apothecary Images

Localized bloodletting often involved scarification, which meant scraping the skin with a cube-shaped brass box containing multiple small knives, followed by cupping, which involved placing a dome-shaped glass over the skin and extracting the air by suction or prior heating.

Haematology is a branch of medicine and a sub-specialty of internal medicine. It focuses on the study, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of diseases that can cause abnormalities in the blood and its various components.

The practice of phlebotomy (Greek phlebos = vein and temnein = to cut) has taken place for over five millennium. Bleeding could be done at many points of the body, chiefly the elbows and knees.

Bloodletting was considered of value in the treatment of hypertension, cases of comas, drowsy headaches and inflammation of the lungs. As much as 210 ounces were bled over a 60 day period.

Leeches have been used in medicine for over 2,500 years. As recently as the 19th century, leeches were used to treat everything from tonsillitis to hemorrhoids.

The history of herbalism is closely tied with the history of medicine from prehistoric times up until the development of the germ theory of disease in the 19th century. ... Evidence-based use of pharmaceutical drugs, often derived from medicinal plants, has largely replaced herbal treatments in modern health care.

In 1844, Irish physician Francis Rynd invented the hollow needle and used it to make the first recorded subcutaneous injections, specifically a sedative to treat neuralgia.