Ancient Greek medicine is often viewed as the foundation which modern medicine is built upon. It changed the Greek’s perception of medicine to be more rational instead of supernatural. Leading this change was Hypocrites himself. He was a physician and philosopher in the Age of Pericles and is known as the “father of western medicine”. He is mostly associated with the Hippocratic Oath in the Hippocratic Corpus. This blog post will go through where Greek medicine all began, works of hypocrites, and what we can learn from ancient Greek medicine.
Anna Jiang . 28/07/2020
A quick introduction to Greek medicine
Ancient Greek medicine was first founded around 800 B.C. (Before Common Era) and moved forward in 200 C.E. (Common Era) [1]. Ancient Greece itself terminated at the end of the period of antiquity (600 AD), which has been split and is now modern-day Greece, Egypt, Italy, and Turkey [1]. Greek medicine itself is quite similar to traditional Chinese medicine and Ayurveda (traditional Indian medicine) since they all promote harmonisation of health [9]. It was also the inspiration for many currently active alternative medicines in the west, such as homeopathy, chiropractic, and naturopathy.
How did it all begin?
As you may know, a large part of Ancient Greece was mythology. Therefore, it is no surprise that mythology is also involved in medicine. in Greek mythology, Apollo was the God of archery, music, and healing. His bow and arrow were though to bring both the plaque and cure [2]. In the Iliad (a poem set in the Trojan war) a priest of Apollo near Troy praised Apollo to bring the plaque to the Greek as Agamemnon has kidnaped his daughter [2]. Since Apollo was also the God of healing, he sent his son Asclepius to Chiron (an expert in soothing drugs and healing) to learn the art of healing [2]. Asclepius then became the first doctor of medicine and had many children who also became doctors [2]. His name was so ingrained in Greek medicine that sometimes, early doctors call themselves sons of Asclepius [2]. Hippocrates was one of them. There were many doctors you may have heard of who came from Greek medicine, such as Galen, Aristotle, and Hippocrates.
Who was Hippocrates?
Hippocrates was a Greek philosopher and physician born around 460 B.C. and died around 370 B.C. in Ancient Greece. Some of his most famous works, which will be expanded on later, were the Hippocratic Corpus, Hippocratic Oath, and the theory of the Four Humors [3]. He was also the founder of the Hippocratic school of medicine, which revolutionised medicine and helped to establish the profession of medicine.
His main ideas revolved around rationality [7] and holistic medicine. As a quote from David Osborn states, “it was Hippocrates who finally freed medicine from the shackles of magic, superstition, and the supernatural” [3]. To show the idea of rationality in medicine, he did experiments and collected data. He showed that diseases were natural, and the resulting symptoms were the body’s responses [3]. in addition to rationality, he believed in a holistic approach to medicine, thus directing us to his theory of the Four Humors.
In present day, he is remembered as the ideal doctor (with compassion, care, and honesty) along with the well known Hippocratic oath.
Now, moving on to the works of Hippocrates.
What are the Four Humors?
The Four Humors are Hippocrates’ underlying theory of health [8]. They are the 4 elements of metabolism of the human body, and that health is the balance of the 4 Humors [8]. The Four Humors are:
Blood, representing air
Phlegm, representing water
Yellow Bile, representing fire
Black Bile, representing earth [8]
This is explained by a quote from Hippocrates himself [8]:
The body of man has in itself blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile; these make up the nature of the body, and through these he feels pain or enjoys health. Now, he enjoys the most perfect health when these elements are duly proportioned to one another in respect to compounding, power and bulk, and when they are perfectly mingled. Pain is felt when one of these elements is in defect or excess or is isolated in the body without being compounded with all the others.
If you would like to read more on this topic, you may go here, where it is discussed in more detail.
What are the Hippocratic Corpus and Hippocratic Oath?
The Hippocratic Corpus is a collection of the works from Hippocrates and students, or doctors, from Greek medical schools [2]. They were either from the Hippocratic school of medicine or a closely allied group [2]. This collection then became the foundation for early modern medicine, With the theme of rationality running throughout. The first translations of this manuscript were in 1839 by Émile Littré, a French philosopher, and he made the translation widely accessible. It was later translated into English by a Scottish doctor called Francis Adams and it is now available online. If you want to read some of the English translations by Dr. Francis Adam, you can find them here.
The Hippocratic Oath is undoubtedly the most famous part of the Hippocratic Corpus. It is the oath that every new doctor must swear upon before they begin practicing medicine, which you’ve probably seen in some medical dramas. The oath originally required new physicians to swear by the healing gods and bind them to their teachers [4]. However, it has been changed in today’s world to fit different cultures and well, because there are too many professors to count. The most important two points, according to Dr. Fabre, were binding the doctors to a “personal commitment to highest medical and ethical standard” and establishes the “inextricable linkage between personal and professional life” [7].
It has always been controversial and debated as to what extent do personal life impact professional. Interestingly, in recent news, a new study published by the “Journal of vascular surgery” on the “extent of unprofessional social media contents among recent vascular surgery fellows and residents” [10]. This study was conducted because a survey showed that large numbers of patients though social media content may affect their choice of physician. The study has found that one-third of vascular trainee’s social media accounts had unprofessional content. However, the study faced backlash on social media and has since been retracted, but you can still find the abstract here.
With the pass of time, the Hippocratic Oath is becoming more and more out of style. Thus, to conclude, let’s go back to our roots and see what we can learn from ancient Greek medicine.
What can we learn from Greek medicine?
Firstly, ancient Greek medicine revolved around diet, drugs, and surgery. With regimen (e.g. exercise, sleep, and stool) taking priority [6]. Nowadays, medicine is more about the miracle pill which is the answer for all. For example, people are now developing a drug to treat obesity.
Secondly, it had a holistic view of health. They believed diseases are related to the way of life and the body’s reaction to the environment [6]. Thus, diseases are related to an individual’s lifestyle (an example would be smoking causes cancer).
Thirdly, Greek medicine offered rational explanations, not just religion, for diseases [6]. It mainly involved preventative medicine which is tailored to the patient [6]. Personalised medicine has now been recognised as more effective than the traditional approach. The final report form CRA (Charles river associate) stated that personalised medicine increased chances of survival; increased efficiency of treatment and reduced side effects [5].
Ancient Greek medicine laid the foundation for medicine and transformed the profession. I hope this blog post has helped you to gain an insight into the Greek medicine and one of the most influential physician of all times.
References
1. National Library of Medicine (2012) Greek Medicine Introduction. Available at: https://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/greek/greek_about.html (25/07/2020).
2. Hall, E. (2020), Hippocrates and Ancient Greek Medicine. Available at: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/ancient-greek-medicine (25/07/2020).
3. Osborn, D. Hippocrates. Available at: http://greekmedicine.net/whos_who/Hippocrates.html (Accessed: 25/07/2020).
4. National Library of Medicine (2012) Greek Medicine Hippocrates. Available at: https://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/greek/greek_hippocrates.html (25/07/2020).
5. Charles River Associates (2018) The Benefit of personalised medicine to patients, society and healthcare systems, page 8. Available at: https://www.ebe-biopharma.eu/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/CRA-EBE-EFPIA-Benefits-of-PM-Final-Report-6-July-2018-STC.pdf (Accessed: 25/07/2020).
6. The Open University (2015) What can we learn from ancient Greek medicine. 31/07/2015. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xi7ma8SJ5tg (Accessed: 25/07/2020).
7. Fabre, J. (1998) 'Title of article', Morden medicine and Hippocratic doctors of ancient Greece, 1998;91:161-163
8. Osborn, D. The Four Humors, Available at: http://www.greekmedicine.net/b_p/Four_Humors.html (Accessed: 25/07/2020).
9. Osborn, D. Introduction, Available at: http://www.greekmedicine.net/introduction.html (Accessed: 25/07/2020).
10. Hardouin, S. et al (2019) 'Title of article', Prevalence of Unprofessional social medial content among young vascular surgeons, Volume 60, issue 3, E31, DOI https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvs2019.01.015.
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