History AQA GCSE Grade 9 Health and the People: Modern Medicine Notes
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Course
History
Institution
GCSE
History AQA GCSE Health and the People: Modern Medicine, printable notes made and used by Grade 9 History student. Contains in-depth facts/research covering every aspect of the specification. Includes analytical-response notes, visual aids, and extremely helpful revision aid for making flashcards, ...
Health and the People: Modern Medicine
Modern Treatment of Disease
Developments in Drugs
Penicillin
1928Tidying his lab, Alexander Fleming finds a Petri dish with mould growing on it and realises that the
mould has killed some of the bacteria around it. He works out which bacteria the penicillin mould can kill.
Fleming writes about his discovery in a medical journal.
1938 Scientists Howard Florey and Ernst Chain discover a method of purifying and producing penicillin.
1940Florey and Chain use mice to test penicillin. The Second World War meant there isn’t enough money
for British companies to produce the drug.
1941Florey and Chain turn their lab at Oxford University into a penicillin factory; trials have positive results.
Florey seeks assistance in the US. The US government sees its potential and offers funding.
1943 Florey trials the drug, using small doses to treat soldiers’ war wounds in North Africa. Many lives are
saved. Mass-production begins in Britain.
1945Margert Hutchinson Rousseau develops a mass-production method. This produces 650 billion doses in
1945.
Drug development
Before penicillin, drugs had been research, tested, and manufactured, but not on such a large scale. After
WWII a large pharmaceutical industry grew. Today the industry researches, develops, tests and produces
many types of drugs. Drug companies are still looking for cures for illnesses like cancer, AIDS or the common
cold.
Drug safety
Drug development hasn’t always been a success. Until the 1960s every new drug was seen as a positive
discovery until the thalidomide disaster, when a drug aimed at helping pregnant women with morning sickness
caused babies to be born with malformed limbs. Thalidomide led to much stricter controls on drug testing and
approval in countries including Britain. The drug is used to today to treat AIDs and leprosy but it is still
controversial.
New Diseases and Treatments
Antibiotic resistance
One of the greatest problems facing modern medicine
Over time, some of the bacteria that have been treated by antibiotics have become resistant.
The WHO said in September 2016 that the danger to the world from antibiotic resistance was now so great
that it was making fighting diseases such as TB, malaria and AIDS much harder and would soon make things
like chemotherapy too high risk.
, MRSA
One of the biggest problems in British hospitals is the ‘superbug’. Infections of MRSA can be life-threatening. A
superbug is a type of bacteria resistant to most antibiotics, making it difficult to treat.
The NHS promotes hand hygiene, reminding patients of the importance of clean hands in the fight against
infection and encouraging them to ask medical staff if they have washed their hands.
Strict hand-washing and cleanliness means the rates of MRSA infections have dropped.
HIV and AIDS
AIDS is a recently recognised disease caused by the HIV virus. HIV attacks the immune system and weakens the
body’s ability to fight infections and disease.
It was first discovered in 1981 but it wasn’t until 1983 when scientists worked out that it was a viral infection.
Like most viral infections there is no cure for HIV but treatments have been developed to allow most people
with HIV to live a normal life for many years after diagnosis.
AIDS is the last stage of the HIV infection when the body has no resistance to simple infections.
Alternative medicine and treatments
Alternative treatments use approaches that may not be scientifically proven but many people find them
effective:
1) Acupuncture = inserting fine needles into the skin with the aim of assisting the body to balance itself
2) Hypnotherapy = using hypnosis as a treatment for illness
3) Herbal medicines = ‘natural’ medicines made from plants, trees or fungi
Impact of War and Technology
Developments in Surgery
The first kidney transplants took place in America in
1954, and in 1967 South African surgeon Christiaan
Blood transfusion had been Techniques in keyhole surgery and
Barnard performed the first successful heart transplant.
attempted in the 1600s but in 1901 laser surgery have developed and
In 1970 the drug cyclosporine was developed to stop
Karl Landsteiner identified blood are now mainstream in most British
the body rejecting transplanted organs.
groups, paving the way for work on hospitals.
blood transfusions.
Major Developments in Surgery
Plastic surgery was first used by Open-heart surgery was performed
Archibald McIndoe to rebuild the first in 1950 by Wilfred G. Bigelow.
faces of airmen burned in WWII. X-rays were discovered by William Roentgen in 1895
and radiation therapy using X-ray machines was
used for treating cancer by 1901. X-rays for diagnosis
became popular with military doctors during WWI,
and both X-rays and radiation therapy became
widespread in hospitals in the 1930s. They are now
routinely used for diagnosis and cancer treatment.
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