Changes in Health and Medicine c.1340 to the present day

Flashcards covering causes of illness and disease from the medieval period to the present day.

Poor diet in the medieval period

Bad harvests led to hunger and malnutrition was common.

Living conditions in medieval towns

Houses were crowded, water was contaminated, and straw floors bred rats, fleas, and lice.

Famine of 1315–17

Torrential rain ruined planting and harvesting in England.

War in the medieval period

Wounds often became gangrenous.

Lack of knowledge in the medieval period

People did not know the link between disease and germs.

Public health problems in industrial towns

Squalid conditions, overcrowding, and sewage contamination led to disease outbreaks.

Miasma theory

The belief that terrible smells caused disease.

Dr. John Snow's discovery

Proved cholera was a waterborne disease through the Broad Street Pump study.

Tenement

A large building divided into separate flats, often overcrowded.

Cholera

An acute intestinal infection caused by contaminated water or food.

Typhoid

A serious infectious disease caused by dirty water or food.

Bubonic plague

Spread by fleas from black rats, causing buboes, fever, and boils.

Pneumonic plague

Spread by breathing or coughing germs, attacking the lungs.

The Black Death

A plague that killed up to 40% of the UK population by the end of 1349.

Spanish Flu

A 1918 pandemic that killed up to 40 million people worldwide.

Tuberculosis (consumption)

Spread by coughs or sneezes, associated with poor housing and working conditions.

HIV/AIDS

A virus spread through blood or body fluids, destroying the body’s immune system.

Pandemic

A disease that spreads across a wide geographical area.

AIDS

Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, caused by HIV.

HIV

Human Immunodeficiency Virus, the virus that causes AIDS.