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Edexcel GCSE History

Edexcel option: Medicine in Britain, c1250-present — Edexcel GCSE History revision

Free revision notes, key terms, common exam traps and 5 practice questions with answers. About 8 minutes to read.

Medieval and early modern, c1250-c1700

  • Explanations were supernatural (God, sin), astrological and Galenic (Four Humours, theory of opposites); treatment meant bleeding, purging, herbal remedies and prayer. Physicians, apothecaries and barber surgeons all treated the sick.
  • The Black Death (1348) was blamed on miasma, God and planetary alignment; responses included flight, flagellation, herbal remedies and quarantine attempts.
  • By 1700, the Renaissance had brought Vesalius, Paré, Harvey, the printing press and the Royal Society, but everyday treatment changed little; the Great Plague (1665) still saw quarantine and pest houses.

c1700-c1900

  • Key individuals: Jenner (vaccination, 1796), Pasteur (germ theory, 1861), Koch (identifying specific microbes), Simpson (chloroform), Lister (antiseptics), Nightingale (hospital reform).
  • Government moved from laissez-faire towards intervention: 1848 Public Health Act (permissive), the 1854 Broad Street pump investigation by John Snow, the Great Stink and Bazalgette's sewers, then the compulsory 1875 Public Health Act.
  • Edexcel's British sector of the Western Front (1914-18) study covers trench conditions, wound infection, the Thomas splint, blood transfusion, X-rays, the RAMC and the chain of evacuation, and how sources are used in a historic environment enquiry.

Key terms

Theory of opposites
Galen's idea of treating illness with the opposite quality.
Apothecary
Person who mixed and sold medicines.
Pest house
Building used to isolate plague or infectious patients.
Vaccination
Using a mild related disease to create immunity.
Magic bullet
A chemical treatment targeting one specific microbe.
RAMC
Royal Army Medical Corps, responsible for wartime medical care.

Common exam traps

  • Forgetting that Edexcel includes the Western Front historic environment with source questions — it is examined, not optional background.
  • Saying medieval people had no treatments; they had many, based on different explanations.
  • Confusing Pasteur (germ theory) with Koch (identifying specific bacteria).

Practice questions with answers

  1. 1. Which theory dominated medieval explanations of illness?

    • • Germ theory
    • • Four Humours
    • • DNA
    • • Magic bullets

    Answer: Four Humours

    Galen's humoral theory shaped diagnosis and treatment.

  2. 2. Give one medieval explanation for the Black Death.

    Answer: Punishment from God, miasma or planetary alignment

    Supernatural and environmental ideas dominated.

  3. 3. Who published germ theory in 1861?

    • • Koch
    • • Pasteur
    • • Lister
    • • Jenner

    Answer: Pasteur

    He proved microbes cause decay and disease.

  4. 4. Explain Koch's contribution to medicine.

    Answer: He identified specific bacteria causing particular diseases, enabling targeted treatments and vaccines

    He built directly on Pasteur's theory.

  5. 5. Chloroform was introduced by:

    • • Simpson
    • • Lister
    • • Nightingale
    • • Snow

    Answer: Simpson

    It provided safer, more effective anaesthesia.

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