What Is Medicine?
Medicine is a profession that involves the diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and palliation of illness. It is one of the world’s oldest and most complex sciences, yet it is often poorly understood by the general public. Medical practitioners must be knowledgeable in many diverse fields in order to provide comprehensive care to their patients. Those fields include the basic sciences (e.g. anatomy, physiology, biochemistry) as well as the social sciences (e.g. epidemiology, history of medicine, pharmacology).
The discipline of nutrition science (or dietetics) is the study of the relationship between food and health, including disease and wellness. The field of medical anthropology is concerned with the study of human culture and society as they pertain to medicine, health and wellness.
During prehistoric times, medicine was considered an art as well as a science. It was practiced using natural remedies – such as herbs, animal parts and minerals, or by religious practices like animism (the notion that inanimate objects have spirits), spiritualism (an appeal to God or communion with ancestor spirits), or shamanism (the vesting of an individual with mystic powers).
Modern scientific biomedical research gradually began to replace prehistoric traditions after the invention of the smallpox vaccine at the end of the 18th century, Edward Jenner’s discoveries around 1900 about the transmission of diseases through bacteria and Robert Koch’s discovery of viruses in the early 20th century. However, traditional folk medicine has continued to exist, and a number of traditional practitioners also perform medical tests and treat diseases.
A physician’s work is conducted within the context of health care systems, which are governed by legal, credentialing and financing frameworks established by governments and/or international organizations. When a patient presents with a clinical problem, a doctor must gather relevant information including the patient’s history, symptoms and physical findings as well as any lab or imaging results and specialist consultations. The physician then makes a decision about the most likely cause or causes of the patient’s problem. The decision may be changed when new information becomes available, such as results from additional testing or a change in the patient’s condition. This is called the “diagnostic process”. The final diagnosis is recorded in the patient’s medical records. The patient is then treated with medicines or other therapies. Depending on the patient’s situation, additional procedures and follow-up treatments may be needed. An article about a particular sign or symptom should try to adhere to the recommended structure below, although it may be necessary to omit or merge sections that seem redundant or excessively repetitive. Please refer to Wikipedia:Manual of Style for guidance on writing articles in this wiki. Also, it is helpful to include etymologies for anatomical features, especially those with Latin or Latinized Greek names. This helps interwiki users and researchers working with older scientific literature.
Medicine is a profession that involves the diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and palliation of illness. It is one of the world’s oldest and most complex sciences, yet it is often poorly understood by the general public. Medical practitioners must be knowledgeable in many diverse fields in order to provide comprehensive care to their patients. Those fields include the basic sciences (e.g. anatomy, physiology, biochemistry) as well as the social sciences (e.g. epidemiology, history of medicine, pharmacology). The discipline of nutrition science (or dietetics) is the study of the relationship between food and health, including disease and wellness. The field of medical anthropology is concerned with the study of human culture and society as they pertain to medicine, health and wellness. During prehistoric times, medicine was considered an art as well as a science. It was practiced using natural remedies – such as herbs, animal parts and minerals, or by religious practices like animism (the notion that inanimate objects have spirits), spiritualism (an appeal to God or communion with ancestor spirits), or shamanism (the vesting of an individual with mystic powers). Modern scientific biomedical research gradually began to replace prehistoric traditions after the invention of the smallpox vaccine at the end of the 18th century, Edward Jenner’s discoveries around 1900 about the transmission of diseases through bacteria and Robert Koch’s discovery of viruses in the early 20th century. However, traditional folk medicine has continued to exist, and a number of traditional practitioners also perform medical tests and treat diseases. A physician’s work is conducted within the context of health care systems, which are governed by legal, credentialing and financing frameworks established by governments and/or international organizations. When a patient presents with a clinical problem, a doctor must gather relevant information including the patient’s history, symptoms and physical findings as well as any lab or imaging results and specialist consultations. The physician then makes a decision about the most likely cause or causes of the patient’s problem. The decision may be changed when new information becomes available, such as results from additional testing or a change in the patient’s condition. This is called the “diagnostic process”. The final diagnosis is recorded in the patient’s medical records. The patient is then treated with medicines or other therapies. Depending on the patient’s situation, additional procedures and follow-up treatments may be needed. An article about a particular sign or symptom should try to adhere to the recommended structure below, although it may be necessary to omit or merge sections that seem redundant or excessively repetitive. Please refer to Wikipedia:Manual of Style for guidance on writing articles in this wiki. Also, it is helpful to include etymologies for anatomical features, especially those with Latin or Latinized Greek names. This helps interwiki users and researchers working with older scientific literature.