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[Jssra]

I searched the past year or so of healthcare-related posts and didn't see this one. I'm kinda surprised. For dwarves, booze is necessary and healthy. It would have to logically follow, to some dwarven physician or another, that pouring alcohol on a wound might be good for an injured dwarf - after all, they're not drinking any while they're in the hospital. And what do you know, that dwarf doesn't get a wound infection. Eventually experience would elaborate the observation into "stronger booze is better for the patient" (rum works better than ale). And it's much more dwarflike to prevent illness with alcohol than with soap.

[Blade Master Model 42]

I've seen it in a couple of larger suggestions. I think, realistically, we'd need distilled hooch first.

In any case, it's still a good suggestion.

[Farmerbob]

  Yes.  Booze for the wounded.  Yes, it's really medicinal.  Really.  Urist McAddict told me so!

[sockless]

We'd need a better distinction between hard liquor and brewed beverages first. But it is a good idea, I have a feeling that it may well be added when Toady gets round to doing up the healthcare, which is hopefully the time when disease gets added in.

[Dynastia]

Anything under around 35% increases the risk of infections, rather than sterilises. I'm not even sure whether medieval folks had the ability to brew liquor that strong. Beer and wine could still be used as primitive painkillers, though.

If you want stronger disinfectants added to the game, I'd suggest either resin from a good-biome fictional DF plant, salt (from mining rocksalt/saltwater evaporation) or powdered sulfur (from mining brimstone). Spider silk threads are also an excellent option ; ancient peoples packed wounds with them because they're naturally antiseptic. And the final poor-man's option for a fort with access to no soap and none of the above would be to use a red-hot iron, or a clod of dirt that somebody has pissed on.

[tsen]

Also, copper and silver surgical tools would be nice. Steel scalpels for edge holding, but the antiseptic properties of silver and copper would be nice to model.

[sockless]

The Boers used spider webs and sugar as dressings. Garlic has often been used as well, so has Aloe Vera.


Distilled alcohol was around in medieval times, but it wasn't that prevalent. I think that the thing that makes brewed beverages increase the risk of infection is actually because the alcohol evaporates, because ale was brewed in medieval times and later as a method of storing water, as it didn't go off.


Cauterisation would be nice touch to the game, is it was, and still is, a fairly common way of sealing wounds. But the part can still get infected, cauterisation just stops the wound from bleeding.


Using booze as a painkiller would be good as well, as it was a fairly common practice in the old days. The problem though is that you bleed more when you are drunk, due to the alcohol in your blood, which makes it thinner.

[Farmerbob]

Well, if we want a good natural antiseptic, we just added honey to the game.

I think booze would work better for dwarves though, just on general dwarfy principles.

[sockless]

For booze to work we would need to have the game differentiate between brewed beverages and distilled beverages.

Honey would be really good though, as it would add unique use to the beekeeping industry.