Colin Ashby
Professor Hutchinson English 2000
May 1, 2017
WHEEL…OF…MEDICINE
The day was Christmas Eve of 2010. My family and I had just gotten home from Christmas Vigil mass to celebrate the monumental holiday that was fast approaching. I remember the day quite vividly as we were all huddled around the TV on our couch, watching National Lampoons: Christmas Vacation when
stomach pain I had been feeling all day had suddenly felt like a knife piercing deep into my body. I immediately shouted, was rushed to the hospital by my parents and later had multiple scans to show that my spleen had ruptured from a soccer game I had the day before. I remember as I was lying still while getting a CAT-scan that I was so perplexed about how medicine and how machines used for medicine had evolved so much. It was somewhat frightening to think about that in ancient times, people were fatally defenseless against a common cold but today some over the counter drug could easily treat it. If anything, medicine in ancient times was essentially a type of luxurious art instead of the scientific mechanism that it is in today’s world. For how complex and absolutely necessary that it is today, medicine deserved much better than how ancient times toiled with it. While it is more than fair to not hold the people of ancient times too
accountable, there should have been a higher standard from the beginning. The in’s and out’s of medicine and all that it entails has changed since Stephen Greenblatt’s multiple descriptions of ancient history and the advancements that arose from it. Although it may not directly talk about medicine as a whole,
Stephen Greenblatt’s The Swerve helps shed some light on the concept that medicine in ancient times is not what is today nor what it will be in the future.
It is without a doubt that medicine and the practice of medicine has drastically changed from ancient times compared to modern times. Simply put, people taking care of people is one of the most understood concepts today as opposed to what it was hundreds if not thousands of years ago. Looking further at ancient times, physician’s never had formal training or experience as they do today with medical school. Their overall understanding was basically flawed, knowing only what was visible to the eye and believing whole-heartedly in
folklore. Yannis Tountas writes, “The ancient Greek’s apprehension of health and illness was based on the theory of the four ‘fluids’ (blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile).” Greek physicians’ knowledge of the human body was not one of orthodox approach either. They were either self taught or would learn from an already practicing physician, yet not truly learning what was really necessary in order to be considered a physician. Today, potential physicians are trained
thoroughly through college, medical school, then residency even before they fully start their careers. Even the way that physician’s operated and the tools used have drastically experienced much needed improvements. When looking at ancient times, doctors would perform surgery in the open without any anesthesia but with tools used for specific purposes. If anything, the patients of ancient times would be objectified by their physicians, as if they were canvases to be
performed on by their artists, not truly knowing what they would be subjected to. Some of the items they would use included forceps, scalpels, and needles.
Today we see many of those same tools used in surgery but in much better environments where a surgical procedure is closed off, namely to maintain sterile conditions for the patient’s health. In a nutshell, ever since ancient times, human beings experienced the problem of deteriorating health and the trouble of
sustaining their individual healthy lives. Medicine was that answer. Fortunately, the continuous and necessary evolution of medicine changed everything. The meaning of medicine no longer registered as a form of art to the mind’s of all but now as a scientific method. We experienced a problem and now we are finally able to understand that problem because the meaning of “medicine” has completely changed.
When talking about the evolution of medicine, we must first understand its past. From the examples I have listed already, we can see that although the general concept of medicine was not advanced, it was still vital to the daily lives of people worldwide. Like anything that we use today, the transformation of medicine was absolutely needed in order for it to prosper. As vague as it seems, things need to continuously improve or keep up with the current time in order to keep being relevant, useful or to keep it from being obsolete. The medical methods and tools used in ancient Greece and Rome reflect the time period for which they were used, symbolizing bare necessities and simplicity. In today’s world neither the methods nor tools would suffice. Gradual improvements were necessary in order for the general population to keep using medicine and to continue to stay healthy. Take the discovery of Penicillin for example. In ancient times and even until its founding in 1928, people would suffer or even die from
bacterial infections such as staphylococci and streptococci or more commonly known as “staph” and “strep throat.” Penicillin immediately made these infections become a thing of the past, easily treating many people from the infection very quickly and efficiently. Today, Penicillin is an obsolete piece in the ever-changing puzzle of medicine. Yet, if not for Penicillin then other advancements would not have been made. That is truly why ancient times are so important. Without them and the slow change of times that came, advancements and improvements would not have been made that would essentially make ideas like medicine better than they were before.
However, as crucially beneficial that ancient times served, they should stay in their respective time in history. Unfortunately, people see the importance of ancient times and want to relive them and their outdated ways in today’s society. One common example is using faith or spirit based exercises to “cure” major health concerns such as cancer, infectious diseases, or terminal illnesses. In a video entitled “Heal Your Body: Spoken Guided Meditation For Pain & Sicknesses, Relieve Pain Naturally,” quiet sounds, vivid colors, and commands given by a man’s whispering voice are projected for twenty three minutes and twenty six seconds for viewers to use to help them meditate. The narrator of the video tells the listener to do things such as to “direct your attention inward” or to “let your awareness shift from the world outside you to the Cosmos within your body.” As if that were not the worse part, people actually believe that videos like this and others actually affect their natural health. The believers see that using practices like meditation or “summoning the cosmos” can benefit them today
similarly if not the same as how a physician would benefit them. Lucretius did not believe in this theory though. As discussed in the beginning of Chapter Eight of The Swerve, “The Way Things Are,” Lucretius believes that faith and material things should be separate from each other, furthering that faith has nothing to do with healing. “He believed that the gods existed. But he also believed that, by “virtue of being gods, they could not possibly be concerned with human beings or with anything that we do.” This just shows The Swerve provides a completely more practical way of thinking in relation to modern concepts. Digging some things up from the ancient world like the Greek’s style of art or Greek political action is one thing, but to re-practice the ancient world’s ways of medicine is detrimental to society. If not for the “swerve” that Greenblatt emphasizes on, patients today would still be subject to the barbaric ways of treating illnesses we see in ancient times.
Yet with any radical and continuous transformation such as Greenblatt’s Swerve, problems will always occur. Not to say that medicine didn’t need restructuring to fit the current needs of people today, but what if too much restructuring causes it to turn into something it’s not? Modern day medicine has developed so much that it truly does not fulfill its initial purpose of diagnosing, treating, and promoting good health to patients. Medicine today is quite different as it dehumanizes patients and treats them as if they were machines. So how do we address this issue? Do we just simply go back to the drawing board and begin where we started thousands of years ago in Ancient Greece? This is still not the answer. Instead, patients should be thought of and treated in their
context. Medicine should be thought of again its simplest sense, like it was during ancient times but should be conducted in a more modern way that addresses the physical and psychological needs of patients. This common ground takes the best of both worlds, creating a field that satisfies its purpose previously stated while ensuring a more comfortable life for its patients. How do we go about this method though? There are two different tactics that solve the complexity of modern day medicine while not existing as some outdated and primitive way of taking care of people: holistic and integrative medicine. These two types can ultimately fix the negativity and coldness of medicine today by focusing more on the patient’s individual needs in order to make them truly feel as if they have been treated. Overall I suggest that holistic and integrative medicines are the necessary solutions that can help re-humanize medicine in order to best give patients the treatment that they deserve.
Before we can talk about the solutions, we must first understand what about medicine needs to be changed and why it must be changed. In today’s world of medicine, patients are commonly seen as objects, not people. This is very different from the ancient world of medicine where Greek practitioners would thoroughly treat their individual patients to the best of their abilities, making sure to tend to their needs or illnesses. Stephen Adams, a medical correspondent from a British news service called The Telegraph, writes, “Medical staff frequently have such little time to deal with them, that patients’ full medical and emotional needs are not met, they say,” and that “Medication errors can result and
wishes to be resuscitated, meaning in some cases that the terminally ill can end up receiving futile treatment.” This is disgusting. By definition and context, medicine in today’s world is essentially not even medicine. It fails to treat
patients’ illnesses or even give them the time of day. Since modern day medicine is almost evil in a way, does that mean that the ancient form of medicine is the only answer? Not necessarily. In truth, both ancient and modern day medicine are the answer for a complete and well functioning treatment of the ill. What should happen is that the best portions of each time period should be taken, getting back to the basics and utilizing the already good for the better. Holistic and integrative medicine actually do a great job of this by using the ancient time’s simplicity while incorporating modern day’s treatment and techniques.
Holistic medicine does a great job of answering the problem of a too developed modern day medical world while not being nearly as primitive as ancient medicine. Webmd.com defines “Holistic Medicine” as “a form of healing that considers the whole person—body, mind, spirit, and emotions—in the quest for optimal health and wellness. According to the holistic medicine philosophy, “one can achieve optimal health—the primary goal of holistic medicine practice— by gaining proper balance in life.” Practitioners of holistic medicine believe that in order to fully treat a patient then all “interdependent parts” must all be in balance, proving to be a little ironic as patients of holistic medicine are essentially treated as machines like standard modern day medicine but in accordance with the holistic principle of “the patient is a person, not a disease.” Treatments are quite vast as they normally fuse prescribed medication with a number of lifestyle
changes. Similarly, integrative medicine is essentially based on the same principles of the holistic approach. Its purpose is to essentially treat the person, not just the illness. The Academy of Integrative Health & Medicine helps to explain “Integrative Medicine” by defining it as “the field of integrative health and medicine reaffirms the importance of the relationship between practitioner and patient, focuses on the whole person, is informed by evidence, and makes use of all appropriate therapeutic approaches, healthcare professionals and professions to achieve optimal health and healing. Simply put, integrative health and
medicine offer best practices for optimal health and healing.” Finally. Unlike the majority of today’s world, integrative medicine primarily focuses on a healthy relationship between the physician and patient during the treatment process, giving them the security and comfort all patients would like to possess. Although patients are typically given prescribed medication, they also undergo a number of physical activities like acupuncture, massages, and even yoga. When doing these and other physical treatments as well as using medication, patients feel physically and psychologically better as their bodies heal. Even if patients are terminally ill, integrative medicine gives them the piece of mind that helps them cope during their treatment experience.
In conclusion, medicine as we know it today has completely changed, bringing about positive and negative consequences. Because of Stephen
Greenblatt’s idea of “The Swerve,” patients experience the more humane side of medical healing while at the same time still not fully experiencing the best quality of treatment. Besides this, The Swerve basically serves as an ice-cold bucket of
water, thrown at the face of society to wake itself up and realize a handful of problems that we are faced with, those being that medicine is much more complex than it what it once was and that patients are not getting the correct treatment that they deserve. Greenblatt’s idea successfully accomplishes his mission of causing awareness to the matter, proving that his arguments to be valid. It was actually Buckminster Fuller who once said, “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To chance something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” Nothing in this world will ever be perfect. Yet, if we are to better ourselves then we must examine the past and present and build towards a better future.
Colin Ashby Professor Hutchinson English 2000 May 1, 2017 Works Cited
Adams, Stephen. “Patients Being Treated ‘like Medical Conditions, Not People’.” The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group, 04 Oct. 2012. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. <http:www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/9585114/Patients-being-treated-like-medical-conditions-not-people.html>
“AIHM: The Academy of Integrative Health & Medicine.” AIHM The Academy of Integrative Health Medicine. The Academy of Integrative Health & Medicine, n.d. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. http://www.aihm.org/about/what-is-integrative-medicine/.
Greenblatt, Stephen. "The Way Things Are." The Swerve: How the World Became Modern. New York: W.W. Norton, 2012. 183. Print.
Jason Stephenson-Sleep Meditation Music. "Heal Your Body: Spoken Guided Meditation For Pain & Sickness, Relieve Pain Naturally." YouTube. YouTube, 11 Apr. 2014. Web. 13 Mar. 2017.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jD3VxSGM-k>.
Tountas, Yannis. "The Historical Origins of the Basic Concepts of Health Promotion and Education: The Role of Ancient Greek Philosophy and Medicine." Health Promotion International, vol. 24, no. 2, June 2009, pp. 185-192.
EBSCOhost, doi:10.1093/heapro/dap006.
“What is Holistic Medicine?” WebMD. Ed. David Kiefer. WebMD, 1 May 2015. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. <http://www.webmd.com/balance/guide/what-is-holisitic-medicine#1>