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Mistakes and perfect medicine
This week our anonymous GP reflects on how a mistake made in a busy, stressful environment could have had serious consequences.
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The secret lives of Britain’s first Black physicians
Dr Annabel Sowemimo explores the web of connections between early Black British doctors, the role of empire in West Africa and the pernicious reach of scientific racism.
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The hell of hay fever
After years suffering in silence, David Jesudason finds speaking out about his pollen allergy gives him hope for a future where his hay-fever symptoms are under control.
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The art of scientific glassblowing
Exciting things happen when art, craft, engineering and science collide. Glassblower Gayle Price is proof of that.
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A symbol of a lost homeland
The story of one protective amulet from Palestine reveals a complex tale. Encompassing the personal history of an influential doctor and collector, it provides a window onto dispossession and exile, and the painful repercussions that are still felt today.
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The law of periodicity for menstruation
Dr Edward Clarke's Law of Periodicity claimed that females who were educated alongside their male peers were developing their minds at the expense of their reproductive organs.
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In search of the ‘nature cure’
Under the competing pressures of modern life, many of us succumb to mental ill health. Samantha Walton explores why so-called ‘nature cures’ don’t help, and how the living world can actually help us.
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The secret hystery of a womb
A Renaissance image of a caesarean section inspired Anna Blundy to recount the story of a hidden, perhaps mysterious part of her body.
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Revelations of blindness in the Middle Ages
Medieval texts, from Islamic medical treatises to Christian books of miracles, reveal surprisingly varied and complex experiences of blindness. But when medieval scholar Jude Seal experienced visual impairment themselves, they gained an even deeper understanding of the lives they were studying.
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WhatsApp aunties and the spread of fake news
The advantages of WhatApp chat groups – especially as a cost-free way of keeping in touch with family around the world – make them fertile ground for the spread of bogus medical advice. Writer Rianna Walcott explores how to encourage ‘aunties’ in the community to question the truth of unattributed health hoaxes.
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Ayurveda: Knowledge for long life
The story of medicine in India is rich and complex. Aarathi Prasad investigates how it came to be this way.
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Fleeing fear, defying prejudice
As teenage refugee Sedra Al-Yousef grappled with rebuilding her life and education in another country, at the same time she used compassion and humanity to demolish populist anti-refugee myths.
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Eugenics and the welfare state
Indy Bhullar explores the ideas of William Beveridge and Richard Titmuss, who were strongly influenced by eugenic thinking, and yet championed the idea of the welfare state.
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The doctor who challenged the unicorn myth
Our era of fake news and medical misinformation is nothing new. Estelle Paranque relays the thrusts and parries of a 440-year-old row over a magical cure-all, the unicorn horn.
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Doctor in the house
A house is not always a home – sometimes it’s impermanent, impersonal. But other aspects of the itinerant life can be the source of a sense of home.
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What Black women do when the NHS fails them
Sabrina-Maria Anderson explores misogynoir – hatred of Black women – within the NHS, and how women like her are consequently turning to other sources of medical support.
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Rediscovering Margaret Louden, a forgotten NHS hero
Bored during lockdown, David Jesudason started bin diving at night. Then a chance discovery set him on a new path: to tell the story of a forgotten female surgeon.
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The painter, the psychiatrist and a fashion for hysteria
A dramatic painting brings a famous event in medical history alive. But it also tells a tale about the health preoccupations of the time.
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The 200-year search for normal people
Sarah Chaney poses the question we’ve likely all asked at some point in our lives: 'Am I normal?’, and explores whether normality even exists.
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Getting under the skin
Before the invention of X-ray in 1895 there was really only one way to accurately study the human body, and that was to cut it open.
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Healing hearts and saving lives
Cardiology is a prestigious specialism, known for its life-saving, heroic staff. But a doctor’s training eventually reveals other, less obvious ways to save lives.
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The pill, autism and me
Realising that her contraceptive was having a negative effect on her mental health, Catriona Reid saw her concerns dismissed by doctors. As an autistic woman on the pill, she was not an anomaly, but has often been made to feel like one.
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Are doctors medical detectives?
Do doctors really identify medical conditions in the same way that detectives solve crimes? Neurologist Jules Montague makes her diagnosis.
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Sun salutations and yoga synthesis in India
Surya namaskars, or sun salutations, have a long history in South Asia, but their place at the heart of modern yoga is more recent.
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The ancient doctors who refused payment
The NHS might only be 70 years old, but the idea of free healthcare goes back to Ancient Greece, when devout doctors provided their services without charge.