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[Silverionmox]

It is known that the Maya sutured wounds with human hair, reduced fractures, and were even skilled dental surgeons, making prostheses from jade and turquoise and filling teeth with iron pyrite.

Gems were also inserted into teeth as embellishment.

[ToXey]

It'd be neat to have dwarves being completely awful concerning medicine. Whereas elves might rather apply herbs and clean a wound with blessed water, the dwarves sooner amputate a leg and apply a steaming iron for blood coagulation. To discern inner bleedings from outer bleedings might make the game a lot more interresting. I also mention soap and dirty water.

[Alternatecash]

It might be worth looking up Chinese and ayurvedic medical practices. Before the time of the roman empire some Chinese alchemists were known to be using "Autumn Minerals" to treat respiratory disorders.  Today we call them steroids. Granted, these were the same people who would routinely give themselves severe mercury and arsenic poisoning...

[darkflagrance]

It might be worth looking up Chinese and ayurvedic medical practices. Before the time of the roman empire some Chinese alchemists were known to be using "Autumn Minerals" to treat respiratory disorders.  Today we call them steroids. Granted, these were the same people who would routinely give themselves severe mercury and arsenic poisoning...

Yes and no. Same civilization, different members thereof - some might have believed in empirical knowledge, while others were superstitious and solely intuitive. I'm sure every age has both its visionary healers and its pseudosciency crackpots.

[Samyotix]

It's interesting how the Greeks did it ...
The Temple to the Healing Gods had a library where temple workers kept an archive of the symptoms people had come in with, what had been done to treat them, and the result. This for several hundred years resulted in a pretty good understanding of what to do, even if they lacked the biochemical insight to explain why something worked.

[PaperJack]

I think dwarfs should gain experience in treating various kinds of wounds and transmit their knowledge to other medics if possible.

For example, Urist the Medic heals Bob the Miner from a concussion. He then goes to a party and tells his fellow medics how he healed the wound. All medics get better at treating concussions.

Also, dwarven medics shouldn't be great medics and utilize medieval like surgery. However, their dentistry is top quality, so we will often see dwarfs with golden teeth, studded with leather, menacing with iron spikes and with pictures of cow cheese carved into them.

If your fortress starts having good enought healthcare other races or dwarfs from nearby settlements should start visiting your fortress for healing.

[G-Flex]

It might be worth looking up Chinese and ayurvedic medical practices. Before the time of the roman empire some Chinese alchemists were known to be using "Autumn Minerals" to treat respiratory disorders.  Today we call them steroids. Granted, these were the same people who would routinely give themselves severe mercury and arsenic poisoning...

Yes and no. Same civilization, different members thereof - some might have believed in empirical knowledge, while others were superstitious and solely intuitive. I'm sure every age has both its visionary healers and its pseudosciency crackpots.

Those categories work fine when dealing with modern medicine, but "science" has not always been what it is now. You could easily have the crackpots and the visionary healers be the same people.

[Funk]

Those categories work fine when dealing with modern medicine, but "science" has not always been what it is now. You could easily have the crackpots and the visionary healers be the same people.

lots of the science of medicine remaind for 100s of yes after thay were discredited
Humorism kept going for 600 after it was discredited.

but Galen more audacious operations — including brain and eye surgeries — that were not tried again for almost two millennia.

Early cataract surgery was developed by the Indian surgeon, Sushruta (6th century BCE)

you can even do a brain op with a ponty stick (you may even not get a vegable)

still i see dwarfs being told to eat Asbestos because thay have a ich.

[SirHoneyBadger]

Hey, if it stops the itch...

Hello everyone!

Just a quick announcement: I am not dead!

My work denied us the Internet, as well as installing some rather stark security measures (I work for an airline, so even though it's uncomfortable, I can't say that it's uncalled for.), so for the last 3-4 months, I haven't had a way to get to the boards.

I'm back now, though, and have my very own computer (finally), so I shouldn't be disappearing again.

I'll also be posting some new research by some of the Forum members to the OP soon. You should have gotten it a lot sooner than you will though. It's been done for months, I just haven't been able to touch it.

[Rotten]

I haven't read the whole thread, so someone might have already said these, but here are my ideas.

Medieval doctors thought bad smells caused disease, these smells were called miasmas. Lucky us, we have miasma! Miasma could make dwarves get sick and/or hinder the healing process of already sick or injured dwarves. An added nudge to get those dead goblins out of your fort!

Legendary doctors should also attract sick/wounded migrants. A lot of times back then, people would travel for MILES for medical treatment (as not much was around). Obviously these migrants would drain your resources, but could prove useful when healed.

Finally, (and I know this has been suggested, but my take), hospitals are really needed. What would be cool is if they had a quality rating, like rooms and dining rooms (bad hospital, good hospital, great hospital, legendary hospital). 3 beds in a line would be a bad hospital, where 30 beds in a large, engraved (to keep patients spirits up), neat room with a well and food stockpiles would be legendary.

[Andeerz]

Hmmm cool thread...  I don't mean to sound like a jerk at all, Rotten, but I would love to see where you got the info.  I'm just curious, not criticizing anything.  This is a subject matter that I would really love to learn more about.  I wonder if I could find a historian to consult with on the matter... 

[Rotten]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miasma_theory_of_disease
As for the migrants thing, I don't remember where I read that... maybe in a history book or something. Here's a revelevant quote from Wiki though:

In the Medieval period the term hospital encompassed hostels for travellers, dispensaries for poor relief, clinics and surgeries for the injured, and homes for the blind, lame, elderly, and mentally ill. Monastic hospitals developed many treatments, both therapeutic and spiritual. Patients were supposed to help each other through prayer and calm, perhaps benefiting as much from this as from any physical treatment offered. Some hospitals had as few as ten beds, but others were far larger. St Leonard's in York is recorded as catering for 225 sick and poor in 1287. And in Florence there were over thirty hospitals by 1400, one of which, the hospital of Santa Maria Nuova had, by 1500, a staff of ten doctors, a pharmacist and several others, including female surgeons.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_medicine

[Silverionmox]

Hmmm cool thread...  I don't mean to sound like a jerk at all, Rotten, but I would love to see where you got the info.  I'm just curious, not criticizing anything.  This is a subject matter that I would really love to learn more about.  I wonder if I could find a historian to consult with on the matter...

Ask away.

[Backpak]

I have not read most of the thread so if this has been brought up sorry. I would like to comment on the wound and surgery part.I would find it would be better if a doctor could not fully cure a wound without the dwarf needing no rest at all. Maybe something like mangled/red could be cured into a broken/yellow with surgery (thorn/wooden/rock needle and dwarf hair for thread.) or a broken/yellow be a moderately wounded/brown with a splint(cloth and a log or rock staff to hold it.)
 But a dwarf cannot go from mangled/red to broken/yellow to moderately wounded/brown without long periods of bed rest between.