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44 results
  • Article
  • Article

The healing power of the physic garden

| Iona Glen

Having experienced the healing power of plants and gardens, Iona Glen goes in search of present-day “physic gardens” and their origins in history.

  • Article
  • Article

The anatomy of a brain dissection

| Moheb CostandiBenjamin Gilbert

Dissecting the brain after death not only helps confirm a diagnosis, but it can also teach us so much more about the symptoms and causes of brain diseases and how to treat them.

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The origins and meanings of pharmacy symbols

What have snakes, unicorns and crocodiles got to do with pharmacies? The history of these modern signs goes back to the Greek gods.

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Desperate housewives and suburban neurosis

| Giulia Smith

Discover how a pioneering health centre replaced housewives’ supposedly empty home lives with a social space that encouraged healthy child rearing.

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The politics and power of audio-description

| Jamie HaleKirsten IrvingChristopher Andreou

Traditional theatre audio-description often lets down artists and audiences. But, done well, it has the potential to be a force for creativity as well as accessibility.

  • Interview
  • Interview

Inside the mind of George Vasey, co-curator of Misbehaving Bodies

| Gwendolyn SmithThomas S G Farnetti

Discover how curator George Vasey honoured the approaches of Jo Spence and Oreet Ashery, who mischievously subvert clichés around illness and death.

  • Interview
  • Interview

How to design an HIV awareness campaign

| Paul Steinberg

Using carefully crafted, colourful graphics is one public health team’s creative approach.

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Sun salutations and yoga synthesis in India

| Lalita Kaplish

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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Interpreting the Ayurvedic Man

| Lalita Kaplish

A British Sign Language video is the latest interpretation of an unique 18th-century Nepali painting about Ayurvedic medicine.

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Providing care across languages

| Niyoshi ShahRanganath Krishnamani

When medics are taught in English but their patients speak other languages, effective communication becomes fraught. Niyoshi Shah explores the linguistic gaps between patient and doctor.

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Going viral in the online anti-vaccine wars

| Alex Green

‘Anti-vaxxers’ are taking their message online using powerful images as well as words. But is the pro campaigners’ response any better?

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Guerrilla public health

| Harry Shapiro

From safe-use guides to needle exchange schemes, Harry Shapiro reflects on 40 years of drug harm reduction in the UK.

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Silent threat

| Vanessa PetersonMichael Salu

As Vanessa Peterson recovered from a frighteningly serious illness, she wondered whether it was linked to air quality. For many communities, she found, pollution is a political issue.

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Children in burns prevention campaigns

| Shane Ewen

Whose responsibility is it to prevent accidental burns and scalds in the home? Shane Ewen’s research shows that it’s everyone’s concern.

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The island of unclaimed bodies

| Allison C MeierAaron Asis

In New York, those who live and die on the extreme edges of society are buried on an isolated island, often forgotten and unmourned. But recent legal changes aim to reduce stigma and restore their dignity.

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Epidemic threats and racist legacies

| Jacob Steere-WilliamsDark Matter

Epidemiology is the systematic, data-driven study of health and disease in populations. But as historian Jacob Steere-Williams suggests, this most scientific of fields emerged in the 19th century imbued with a doctrine of Western imperialism – a legacy that continues to influence how we talk about disease.

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Picturing mental health

| Lalita KaplishSolomon Szekir-Papasavva

Ron Hampshire created artworks while resident at Netherne psychiatric hospital. What can we learn from them?

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Intelligence testing, race and eugenics

| Nazlin BhimaniGergo Varga

Specious ideas and assumptions about intelligence that were born during the great flourishing of eugenics well over 100 years ago still inform the British education system today, as Nazlin Bhimani reveals.

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The life and death of Tamagotchi and the virtual pet

| Jenna Jovi

Discover how the 1990s craze for Tamagotchis became a flood of robotic and virtual pets, sending their owners on an emotional rollercoaster ride.