Modern medicine has come a long way since medieval times. Surgical instruments are now clean and sterilized, and not many of them appear particularly threatening. However, if you had lived a few hundred years ago, things were very different. Back in the days of the plague you would have felt terrified of visiting a doctor. Just the name alone would have been enough to strike fear into the heart of those suffering illness. Both the surgical methods, and the tools used were almost torturous. Here are 5 of the most terrifying surgical instruments ever made.
#5 The Artificial Leech
Image Source: Kirill Iorish / http://www.flickr.com/photos/iorish/4101326466/
Doctors in the 1800’s believed that by applying leeches to the body, the afflicted would have any disease sucked from their body through the blood. However as medicine progressed, it appears that they realised that this method of treatment was quite primitive, and so created “the artificial leech”.
The artificial leech worked by using a rotating blade that would open a wound and create a vacuum, this was suitable for sucking blood through into a tube.
#4 The Scarificator
Image source: Ledgr / http://www.flickr.com/photos/ledgr/8456082763/
As medicine advanced, so did medical technology. Scarificators, also known as “mechanical leeches”, were an equally terrifying way to draw blood from a patient. Spring-loaded blades in the scarificator would cut into the skin and the blood would be collected in a glass cup. It wasn’t medieval medicine that invented the process though, scarification has existed for hundreds of years as an ancient body art.
#3 The Tobacco Smoke Enema
Image source: Wiki / Public domain
Yes, you did read that correctly. Tobacco smoke enemas were common in previous years and given for anything from a common cold to cholera. Tobacco smoke was infused into a patient’s rectum, for many varying purposes, the most common cause being death by drowning.
This unique medical apparatus was used to help revive people who were “apparently dead” by making use of the stimulant properties found in tobacco by bellowing smoke up the rectum. According to QI (video below), the bellows could be found hung along the Thames river at certain points along with life buoys. This is also how the phrase “to blow smoke up one’s a**e” was coined.
#2 The Tonsil Guillotine
Image source: Jenny O’Donnell / http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:BLW_Tonsil_Guillotine.jpg
The Tonsil Guillotine worked in a similar way to that of a traditional guillotine, by slicing off the infected tonsils with a slicing motion. The double guillotine device would enable a surgical practitioner to remove both tonsils at once. However, the inaccuracy of the device often lead to hemorrhaging, so the tonsil guillotine was replaced by forceps and scalpels in the early 20th century.
#1 Trephine
Image source: Wiki / Public domain
At first glance, the Trephine doesn’t look as terrifying as some of other surgical instruments on this list, but don’t be fooled by its appearance. The Trephine was a hand-powered drill, used to drill into human bone, namely the skull. There was a spike at the end of a blade located inside the handle, the spike would be used to start the procedure, holding the rest of the Trephine in place, as the surgeon bore down into the skull with the cylindrical blade. Think corkscrews and you’re almost there.
There were many, many surgical instruments in times before now that were truly terrifying. Imagine having to endure the use of even one of these tools in today’s world of modern medicine.
Hayley Reeve is a digital content marketer for Surgical Holdings. An award winning manufacturer of British surgical instruments. Visit the blog for more on the surgical industry, or find them on Facebook and Twitter.
