MEDICINE                                                                                                                                                                                                                          Medicine is the science and practice of preventing, diagnosing, and treating diseases. The term is also used specifically for the management of disease by no surgical methods, for example by drugs, diet; e.t.c. Medicine involves the study of anatomy, psychology, and biochemistry of the body in health as well as the changes that occur in disease (pathology). Anatomy is the study of the structure of living organisms; it involves embryology (the study of development), histology (tissues), and cytology (cells). Psychology is the scientific study of the behavior of man and animals. Different schools of psychology use different methods and theories. These include behaviorism; which is experimental psychology, in which laboratory experiments are used to investigate factors influencing behavior (particularly memory, perception and learning); Gestalt psychology; associationist psychology; and Psychoanalysis, clinical psychology applies these approaches to the understanding and treatment of mental illness. Educational psychology studies the way in which children learn, in order to intervene as problem arise. Occupational psychology studies people in their working environment.                                     Biochemistry is the scientific study of the chemical composition and reactions of living organisms. Pathology is the study of disease and disease processes in other to understand their causes and nature. Medicine is closely connected with pharmacology (the study of drugs).                                                                                                                                                         Medicine has its origin s in ancient Greece. The medical school Cnidos, established in the 7th century BC, was concerned purely with the description of systems, whereas that founded later by Hippocrates considered the causes of symptoms in relation to the patient and the environment. In the Alexandrian school the emphasis was on the effects of disease rather than the causes. All existing knowledge of medicine was coordinated and supplemented in the 2nd century AD, by Galen, whose influence prevailed until the Renaissance. Landmarks in the development of modern medicine were the publication of Vesalius major work on anatomy (1543) and of William Harvey's discovery of the circulation of the blood (1628). The nature, treatment and prevention of infectious diseases were illuminated by the researchers of Pasteur, Koch and Klebs in the 19th century; their work directed Joseph Lister in 1865 to the discovery of antiseptics, by means of which wound healing and hospital sanitation were greatly improved. Medicine was revolutionized in this century and beyond by advances in chemistry and laboratory techniques and equipment, old ideas of infectious disease epidemiology were replaced with bacteriology and virology.                                                                                                         Bacteria and micro-organisms were first discovered by Antonie Van Leeuwenhoek in 1676 with a microscope initiating the scientific field of microbiology. In 1847 Ignaz Semmelweis (1818-1865) reduced the death rate of new mothers from child bed fever by the simple expedient of requiring physicians to clean their hands before attending to women in childbirth. His discovery pre-dated the germ theory of disease. However, his discovery was not appreciated by his contemporaries and came into general use only with discoveries of British surgeon Joseph Lister.                                                                                        After Charles Darwin's 1859 publication of origin of species, Gregor Mendel (1822-1884) published in 1865 his books on pea plants, which would be later known as Mendel's laws.                                                                                                                                     Chemotherapy (the treatment of disease by chemical agents) was revolutionized in 1911, when Ehrlich introduced salvarsan for treating syphilis. The late 1930s saw the development of the sul-phonamides – the first powerful general antibacterial drugs – and World War II provided the stimulus for the widespread production and use of antibiotics (the first which was penicillin). Together these drugs have enabled most infectious diseases to be cured. Viruses, however, do not succumb to antibiotics and the control of viral diseases has relied on immunological methods derived from Jenner's discovery of vaccination in 1798. With infectious diseases under control, medical research since World War II has concentrated on the organic diseases, especially coronary artery disease, stroke, e.t.c., and cancer. The emphasis has also been on preventive medicine, with establishment of the World Health Organization in 1948, campaigns to eradicate epidemic diseases, and the establishment of pre and ante-natal clinics, welfare centers, e.t.c., in many parts of the world.                                                                                                                 The 1953 discovery of the structure of DNA by Watson and Crick opened the door to molecular biology and modern genetics. During the late 19th century and the first part of the 20th century, several physicians such as Nobel price winner Alexis Carrel, supported eugenics, a theory first formulated in 1865 by Francis Galtron.                                           Eugenic was discredited as a science after the Nazis experiments in World War II became known; however compulsory sterilization programs continued to be used in modern countries (including the US, Sweden, and Peru) until much later.                                                       Semmelweis's work was supported by the discoveries made by Louis Pasteur linking micro organisms with disease, Pasteur brought about a revolution in medicine. He also invented with Claude Bernard (1813-1878) the process of Pasteurization still in use today. His experiment confirmed the germ theory, Claude Bernard aimed at establishing scientific method in medicine; he published an introduction to the study of experimental medicine in 1865. Beside this, Pasteur along with Robert Koch (who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1905), founded bacteriology, Koch was also famous for the discovery of the tubercle bacillus (1882) and the cholera bacillus (1883) and for his development of Koch's postulate.                                                                                                                                      The participation of women in medical care beyond serving as mid wives, sitters and cleaning women was brought by the likes of Florence Nightingale. These women showed a previously male dominated profession, the element role nursing in order to lesson the aggravation of Elizabeth Blackwell (1821-1910) became the first woman to formally study, and subsequently practice medicine in the United States. It was in this era that actual cures were developed for certain endemic infectious diseases. However the decline in many of the most lethal diseases was more due to improvements in public health and nutrition than to medicine. It was not until the 20th century that the application of the scientific method to medical research began to produce multiple important developments in medicine, with great advances in pharmacology and surgery.                                                        During the First World War, Alexis Carrel and Henry Dakin developed the Carrel-Dakin method of treating wounds with irrigation, Dakin's solution, a germicide which helped prevent gangrene. The war spurred the usage of Roentgen's x-ray, and the electrocardiograph, for the monitoring of internal bodily functions. The Second World War saw the introduction of wide spread and effective antimicrobial therapy with the development and mass production of penicillin anti biotic, made possible by the collaboration of British scientists with the American pharmaceutical industry. Lunatic asylum began to appear in the industrial era. Emi Kraepelin (1856-1926) introduced new medical categories of mental illness, which eventually came into psychiatric usage despite their basis in behavior rather than pathology or etiology. In the 1930s several controversial medical practices were introduced including inducing seizures (by electroshock, insulin or other drugs) or cutting parts of the brain apart (leucotomy or lobotomy). Both came into widespread use by psychiatry, but there were grave concerns and much opposition on grounds of basic morality, harmful effects, or misuse. In the 1950s new psychiatric drugs notably the antipsychotic chlorpromazine, were designed in laboratories and slowly came into preferred use of psychiatric hospital.                                      The 20th century widespread a shift from a master- apprentice paradigm of teaching of clinical medicine to a more "democratic" system of medical schools. With the advent of the evidence – based medicine and great advances of information technology, as medicine gave a way to making surgery safe, surgery found a way of working together with medicine.                                                                                                                                         Surgery is the branch of medicine in which disorders and injuries are treated by operation, usually with the patient in a state of anesthesia. Specializations (e.g. gastro intestinal surgery, neurosurgery, ophthalmological surgery) and great ingenuity in the design of surgical instruments have made surgery extremely safe and a usually successful procedure.                                                                                                                                                     Recent advances include techniques in transplantation surgery, operations on the exposed heart, the use of extreme cold to destroy tissues (cryosurgery), the use if lasers and ultrasonic, and the development of microsurgery, in which surgeons operate through a special microscope using miniaturized instruments.                                                                 Different fields in medicine have helped in so many cases, and diseases. E.g., Physiotherapy has been efficient in the treatment of stroke, Radiotherapy in the treatment of variety of cancer. Medicine has been widespread and broad, having different fields; makes it one of the hardest course to study. Despite its rigidity, the necessity of medicine made it continuous and tends to adapt to the different kinds of people that uses it.                                  All over the world, the deficiency of human increases as even the poor live to suffer this defect. People have always looked for a way to handle them selves during these defects, the rich could visit the hospital, the poor may visit the hospital, clinic or even administer drugs them selves from a pharmacy. Most times lack of emergency funds keeps the poor struggling at such times, due to the hope in life they may live by either this defect living the host on its own or this category of people searches for a cure them selves. This procedure has lead to the production of local medicine, which is usually still as herbs, and obviously works for the people. The efficiency and prize of these local herbal medicines attract people of different areas and tribes, making the usage high in several areas. This method of production and usage of medicine is high in countries in Africa. This has made it possible for the poor to survive, but apart from the reasons of which this method is used, I find myself very surprise about the authenticity and efficacy of this method. Fortunately, I usually find the selves of others who administer such drugs, and I have been opportune to see the efficacy and test such a method myself.                                 In a country like Nigeria, you see even the rich and poor giving a hand for such herbal medicines. This country have grown in this aspect and formulated a different and harder means of physiotherapy, which they believe is more efficient. This means is more painful and is useful in the fixing of broken hands, legs, and fractures e.t.c.; despite the pain, both men and women with stroke and other ailments needing physiotherapy finds them selves receiving such a treatment. Having lived and trained by a mother (Hannah Pere) who is a physiotherapist and a professional in the manufacture and administration of such medicines. I have seen and obviously watched a lot, I became a bit interested when she discovered the great works of a fern (A perennial leafy pteridophyte plants of the class pteropsida or filicinae according to some classification schemes; 9000-15000 species). She used the fern to relax the nerves, and as sleeping pills, e.t.c; her discovery grew further when the plant was accidentally mix with another, which she uses for the amendment of a broken bone. This mixture made the adjustment of the broken hand rapid. She later tried it on a broken kneecap of another patient. This patient was about to go to the hospital for amputation, due to the kneecap being divided into two, and has believed a broken kneecap cannot be amended, except with surgery, and such a procedure lives is leg unbendable. The broken kneecap was amended, with little of physiotherapy and a regular usage of the herb in bandaging of the leg. This procedure took less than three months to heal. The procedure of hers is usually use in the amendment of any broken part of the bone, including skull fractures. Later on, this same plant was use in the cure of breast cancer and fibroid. I worked with her for a while; at my time of stay, I helped in doing things for her and learnt. We both were interested in curing her father who had prostrate cancer. This led to another of her discovery, which she used herbs in making tea; this tea is regularly giving to the patient who is suffering from prostrate cancer or fibroid. This herbs cured this diseases, and took be aback. I left her works for a while, as long as until now, until I discovered a plant that could detect the pregnancy of a woman. This plant was soaked in water, scratches a pregnant woman thoroughly. I never knew this was what my mother used in knowing those that her pregnant and those that has a large fibroid, until I meet her using my same procedure, then I asked myself, what does this people not know? A question I never answered.                                                                The spread of medicine has gone beyond our eyes, so many fields, so many things to learn, so many things to teach. Medicine is a world of its own.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             Tare-otu .P. Kennedy                                                                                                                      TARE-OTU IV