4.2.2

Alternative Treatments & Transplants

Test yourself

Alternative Treatments in the 20th Century

Alternative therapies became increasingly popular in the last few decades of the 20th century in Britain. These treatments are not scientifically proven and are often not effective at all.

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Little evidence for alternative treatments

  • William Farr’s collection of medical statistics helped Dr Snow discover the cause of cholera outbreaks and Hippocrates, Galen and Hunter all supported scientific observation of patients to find the best treatment.
  • Most alternative therapies are not backed up by statistics, observation or scientific research.
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Different to medieval times

  • Culturally, alternative medicine is different in the modern day because it is not mainstream or accepted practice.
    • This is the opposite of medicine in the medieval era which was dominated by medicine from apothecaries etc.
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Alternative treatments on the NHS

  • Alternative treatments today generally use natural herbs/plants or theories about the body to relieve pain and illness.
  • Some of these treatments are more accepted and are available on the NHS.
  • For example, acupuncture (put needles in certain points of someone’s body) and homeopathy (treating people with weak solutions made of natural substances).
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Prevention vs treatment

  • There has been a trend towards ‘positive health’. This means that people focus on the prevention of disease and illness rather than curing it. This means a focus on prevention rather than cures.
  • People are now more concerned with a healthy diet and regular exercise.
  • This has been accompanied by a rise in screening, which checks people to make sure they are healthy and catches early signs of disease.

Transplant Surgery in the 20th Century

Technological developments have allowed us to do transplants of organs and other body parts from one person to another.

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Organ transplants

  • In 1952, surgeons successfully performed an organ (kidney) transplant. The first organ transplant in Britain was in 1960.
  • In 1967, a South African surgeon called Christian Barnard successfully performed a heart transplant for the first time (but the patient only lived 2.5 weeks). The first heart transplant in Britain was in 1968.
  • In 1986, a British woman called Davina Thompson becomes the first patient to successfully receive a heart, lung and liver transplant.
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Accepting transplant organs

  • Transplanted organs were often “rejected” by the body because the body’s immune system recognised that the body parts were not from that person.
  • Immunosuppressant drugs can stop the body from rejecting transplanted organs.
  • In 1970, a British scientist called Roy Calne developed a drug (immunosuppressant) which stopped the body rejecting transplanted organs. This was called cyclosporine.
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Face transplants

  • In 2006, the first partial face transplant was successfully performed.
  • In 2008, the first full face transplant was successfully performed.

Jump to other topics

1Medicine Stands Still

2The Beginnings of Change

3A Revolution in Medicine

4Modern Medicine

5Themes in Public Health

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