The Marvel of Modern Medicine.

Chuck Stone

I'd probably be dead only for the marvel of modern medicine. I'm asthmatic so I need to manage my condition with medicine.

I'd have a horrible limp if I hadn't got my Achilles tendon sewn back together a few years ago after snapping it playing futbol.

I'd have a mouth full of rotten teeth had I not got fillings to repair the holes that appear from enjoying our luscious modern diet.

We are truly living in an amazing world where humans can be fixed with drugs and surgery.

What has modern medicine done for you lately?

donvito99

Chuck Stone = 6 Million Dollar Man?

Haelium

Well I can take a pill that stops me from getting the ****s if I eat greasy fast food.

Not exactly a miracle, but it's pretty handy.

aaronjumper

Nothing, I can't afford it. Had to pay €100 last time I was in hospital for four stitches and a Tetnis shot.

Shryke

Thalidomide. What was the question?

Chuck Stone

aaronjumper wrote: »

Had to pay €100 last time I was in hospital for four stitches and a Tetnis shot.

That's cheap. Not so long ago that might have killed you. Thank your lucky stars that you live in this fantastic modern world of marvellous medicines and procedures.

TheFisherKing

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/11856.php

NegativeCreep

I'd probably have no right arm and my feet would face the wrong way because of clubfoot.

I'm the fine specimen of a man I am today because of the marvel of modern medicine.

Chuck Stone

Shryke wrote: »

Thalidomide. What was the question?

TheFisherKing wrote: »

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/11856.php

Oh FFS.

aaronjumper

Chuck Stone wrote: »

That's cheap. Not so long ago that might have killed you. Thank your lucky stars that you live in this fantastic modern world of marvellous medicines and procedures.

Damn you and your proving me wrong in public! :pac:

Yeah but I was trying to save money not spend it. It was expensive for me at the time, not to mention the seven hour wait in A&E.

Modern medicine is pretty good but it's not exactly cheap.

darrcow

i can stay hard for hours now all i need is 1 little tablet

Tiddlypeeps

TheFisherKing wrote: »

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/11856.php

That article is 8 years old!

Either way what would deaths have been if the hospitals didn't exists.

ScumLord

I almost died quite recently due to an infection. Thanks modern medicine!

Real Life

im with you there OP. im living with half a bowel and if the other half hadnt been removed id be dead. But because of modern medicine i can live like this.

Chuck Stone

Real Life wrote: »

im with you there OP. im living with half a bowel and if the other half hadnt been removed id be dead. But because of modern medicine i can live like this.

Good to hear you're okay Sir.

Hippies!

Nothing, I'm a marvel of natural selection unlike you

mackg

I've epilepsy. It's practically a non issue because of the tablets though.

Lollers

Your treatment if you don't have health insurance.

Tbh I would not be here if it weren't for some of the brilliant medical staff we have in this country. Pity about the shysters running the health service though.

TheFisherKing

Tiddlypeeps wrote: »

That article is 8 years old!

Fair enough, here's a more up to-date one:

Medical errors kill more than a quarter million people every year in the United States and injure millions. Add them all up and "you have probably the third leading cause of death" in the country, says Dr. Peter Pronovost, an anesthesiologist and critical care physician at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/06/09/health/medical-mistakes/index.html

Either way what would deaths have been if the hospitals didn't exists.

Eh, you think I don't want hospitals to exist because I injected some balance to the sycophantic praising? Well, I don't.

To point out the inadequacies in something, does not make one opposed to it's very existence - just to the inadequacies .

Chuck Stone

mackg wrote: »

I've epilepsy. It's practically a non issue because of the tablets though.

Fantastic.

Imagine.. in the olden days they thought epilepsy was caused by demons and it could have resulted in the brutal death of the sufferer.

These days it's just another condition that is managed by taking a few marvellous pills.

Chuck Stone

TheFisherKing wrote: »

Eh, you think I don't want hospitals to exist because I injected some balance to the sycophantic praising?

Sycophantic praising my hole. I'm anything but a sycophant believe me.

Btw pointing to the outliers is not 'injecting balance'.

Is modern medicine perfect? No.

Is modern medicine is truly marvellous?

Hell yeah.

barbiegirl

I just had an operation performed with the help of robotics. :-). It means that after 2 smaller ones to come my hubbie and I will have a chance to be parents. Even 10 years ago the technology wasn't there to help us.

Yes mistakes are made, my dad was killed by one, but without medical intervention both my parents would not be alive or have lived as long as they do/did. My youngest and eldest brothers would be dead, an other brother would have a gammie arm and leg, my sister would be in constant pain, really only myself and one brother would be relatively OK.

opinion guy

TheFisherKing wrote: »

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/11856.php

For the most part prescription errors are failures of the information systems in medicine which are woefully outdated, not of medicine itself. I grant you its a subtle distinction, but its an important one. We need electronic prescribing. Now.

dxhound2005

I have one of the conditions covered by the Long Term Illness Scheme. Without the medications provided by the scheme free of charge with no means test I would only survive a short time. I estimate that the medications would cost me many hundreds of Euro per month. And they were not available at all less than a hundred years ago, before then my condition was a death sentence.

http://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/health/health_related_benefits_and_entitlements/long_term_illness_scheme.html#la82be

So I am suitably grateful to modern medicine and the taxpayers of the country for my continued survival. Another phenomenon of modern times is the startling increase in longevity in developed countries.

AnonoBoy

I was very uptight and grumpy as a young man. But thanks to a remarkable procedure in which the stick was removed from my ass I am now fun-loving and easy-going.

Thanks Modern Medicine!

Chuck Stone

Anyone for a codeine party?

Madam_X

Just the usual stuff for me like antibiotics, and steroids/anti-histamines for sinus trouble/allergies. But I know people who had meningitis and penicillin saved them; people who could barely function with depression who now live full and happy lives thanks to just a small daily dose of anti-depressants; people able to manage type 1 diabetes easily - such a serious condition... Even HIV/AIDS, while obviously to be avoided, isn't the death sentence it was.

It's not without its drawbacks... not sure what they are, it would seem to me that they are usually due to misuse if the medicine rather than the medicine itself, but it has to be said in order to appease the "Medicine is all a scam - it's just a big pharma conspiracy" crowd... who'd hoover up the penicillin if they contracted meningitis.

Zaph

Well among other things I'd have no legs from just above the knees. Bumming around for the rest of my life would suck.

Sunnyisland

I suffer from Inflammatory arthritis with out modern medicine I couldn't walk or have the use of my left hand.

Shane-KornSpace

I read yesterday that scientists discovered how to get Stem Cells from urine!!

Frynge

I got pumped full of anti-histamines and steroids when i went into anaphalactic shock.

allergy to a nut

kowloon

Insulin. If I get a pump I'll be able to call myself a cyborg which makes the whole pancreas failure thing worth it.

danslevent

It's the little things that I find amazing too, like antihistamines. Hay fever etc must have been horrific for sufferers before the invention of them.
Also lip balm for chapped lips from the cold...the little things!

Andy-Pandy

My appendix would have killed me when i was twelve.

michellie

My psoriasis is controlled very well by steroid creams.

My little nephew was cured of meningitis when he was a baby and also had heart surgery 2 years ago, he's doing great now.

ScumLord

Madam_X wrote: »

Just the usual stuff for me like antibiotics, and steroids/anti-histamines for sinus trouble/allergies. But I know people who had meningitis and penicillin saved them; people who could barely function with depression who now live full and happy lives thanks to just a small daily dose of anti-depressants; people able to manage type 1 diabetes easily - such a serious condition... Even HIV/AIDS, while obviously to be avoided, isn't the death sentence it was.

What gets me isn't the big things we've cured but how something minor could have killed you a hundred years ago. Infections are easy to cure now but back then a spot could get out of control and kill you. If you nick the inside of your nose when picking it the infection can spread straight into your brain. Constipation could have killed you, if something is preventing you from pissing, dead in 2 days!

Just about anything that you take antibiotics for these days was potentially life threatening a century ago.

Seaneh

Whelp, I had a stroke just voer 3 years ago, without a MRI they wouldn't have found the clot as it wasn't showing up on CT scans and without the use of anti-coagulants like Heprain, Clexane and Warfarin, I'd be dead. Also had surgery on both ears to remove acute infections that started all the nastiness.

Was diagnosed with Hypothyroidism last thursday, and now thanks to synthetic thyroid hormones, specifically Eltroxcin, I have a decent chance of starting to feel better again soon. The last 5/6 months have been ****ing horrible, but the future is looking rosy again.

mfceiling

darrcow wrote: »

i can stay hard for hours now all i need is 1 little tablet

Yeah those tough guy pills are great alright...

Seaneh

Oh, and one I always forget. I also wear a hearing aid, without which lots of every day situations would be really ****ing annoying.

CruelCoin

1: Get throat infection, turns septic, run 42c temperature
2: Go to doctor, get medicine
3: ???
4: Profit!

Dyr

Chuck Stone wrote: »

I'd probably be dead only for the marvel of modern medicine. I'm asthmatic so I need to manage my condition with medicine.

I'd have a horrible limp if I hadn't got my Achilles tendon sewn back together a few years ago after snapping it playing futbol.

I'd have a mouth full of rotten teeth had I not got fillings to repair the holes that appear from enjoying our luscious modern diet.

We are truly living in an amazing world where humans can be fixed with drugs and surgery.

What has modern medicine done for you lately?

Not enough, I want full body bionics, I want to live forever and have f**king lasers

Bruthal

Chuck Stone wrote: »

I'd probably be dead only for the marvel of modern medicine. I'm asthmatic so I need to manage my condition with medicine.

I'd have a horrible limp if I hadn't got my Achilles tendon sewn back together a few years ago after snapping it playing futbol.

What has modern medicine done for you lately?

Similar to two of your items there, have the asthma, although since the smoking ban, it is not near as bad as it was. But still, the inhalers are a marvel really for anyone that needs them.

And last dec 11th, slipped on my own stairs and broke leg in bits. About 20 screws and two stainless plates, and highly skilled surgery no doubt, and walking grand now, which took about 6 months to manage.

Akrasia

Without medical science, chances are we would all have close friends and relatives who have been killed or maimed by smallpox, Polio or TB

That said, you can't beat a bit of black rhino horn or something else extracted from an endangered species to cure what ails ya.

seamus

Akrasia wrote: »

Without medical science, chances are we would all have close friends and relatives who have been killed or maimed by smallpox, Polio or TB

Closer than that. A large number of us would be raised by someone other than our parents because our mothers had died in childbirth and/or our fathers succumbed to various illnesses.

We would also habitually talk about how many living and dead siblings we have as the deaths of infants and toddlers would literally be an everyday occurence.

Wibbs

Nothing so far thank god/fate/the universe. I've been very lucky on that front *touch wood*. NO allergies that I know of and nothing major failed or went gammy. Sure I've had the odd infection over the years, but never took antibiotics for them as luckily they went away on their own. Ive had a fair few stitches over the years, but they had them from way back so... With all that you'd think I'd look like this but I'm more a case of this

seamus wrote: »

Closer than that. A large number of us would be raised by someone other than our parents because our mothers had died in childbirth and/or our fathers succumbed to various illnesses.

We would also habitually talk about how many living and dead siblings we have as the deaths of infants and toddlers would literally be an everyday occurence.

That was the biggie in the past. Infant mortality was scarily high. That said, outside the rolling plagues of the middle ages, if you actually made it to 20 and thereafter avoided accident death or war, your chances of hitting 70(if you were male) were pretty good and not that far off the odds today for a 20 year old*. We're much more likely to see 80 plus though. It's remarkable how many famous types from the past got to good ages. EG Michelangelo and Titian were in their late 80's and most of the famous arty types of the time hit 70 plus. In Roman times 70 odd wasn't so unusual. Roman soldiers would recieve a pension and a bit of land to farm after 25 years service, so they were considered still useful soldiers up to their mid 40's. The very poor and the very rich tended to die earlier. One from undernourishment and the other from over. Better to be in the middle back in the day.



*one could argue slightly higher if you take away modern medicine. EG type 2 diabetes was significantly rarer in the populations of the past and almost unknown in tribal types.

Bruthal

Wibbs wrote: »

*one could argue slightly higher if you take away modern medicine. EG type 2 diabetes was significantly rarer in the populations of the past and almost unknown in tribal types.

Yea we are likely living beyond our natural lifespan really, which has its own problems in later life too.

opinion guy

Wibbs wrote: »

Nothing so far thank god/fate/the universe. I've been very lucky on that front *touch wood*. NO allergies that I know of and nothing major failed or went gammy. Sure I've had the odd infection over the years, but never took antibiotics for them as luckily they went away on their own. Ive had a fair few stitches over the years, but they had them from way back so... With all that you'd think I'd look like this but I'm more a case of this

Lol....I always imagined you to look just like your avatar :P

That was the biggie in the past. Infant mortality was scarily high. That said, outside the rolling plagues of the middle ages, if you actually made it to 20 and thereafter avoided accident death or war, your chances of hitting 70(if you were male) were pretty good and not that far off the odds today for a 20 year old*. We're much more likely to see 80 plus though. It's remarkable how many famous types from the past got to good ages. EG Michelangelo and Titian were in their late 80's and most of the famous arty types of the time hit 70 plus. In Roman times 70 odd wasn't so unusual. Roman soldiers would recieve a pension and a bit of land to farm after 25 years service, so they were considered still useful soldiers up to their mid 40's. The very poor and the very rich tended to die earlier. One from undernourishment and the other from over. Better to be in the middle back in the day.



*one could argue slightly higher if you take away modern medicine. Eg type 2 diabetes was significantly rarer in the populations of the past and almost unknown in tribal types.

Funny recently I was wondering what would life expectancy be if nobody had invented smoking. It must have had a huge hit on life expectancy figures in the 20th century.

robbie7730 wrote: »

Yea we are likely living beyond our natural lifespan really, which has its own problems in later life too.

What are you basing this on ?

Bruthal

opinion guy wrote: »

What are you basing this on ?

Would you believe, if we were not living in warm dry houses, driving to the supermarket for our lumps of steak, and availing of the modern medicines the thread is about, that the average age for a human would be pushing 80?

seamus

robbie7730 wrote: »

Would you believe, if we were not living in warm dry houses, driving to the supermarket for our lumps of steak, and availing of the modern medicines the thread is about, that the average age for a human would be pushing 80?

Care to give any evidence to back up this claim?

You do know what "average age" means, right?

Jezek

That we are living beyond reproductive age (i.e. post-menopause for women and post erection-ability for a lot of men), and also beyond the age at which our children would be grown up (max 60 years old) basically means that our bodies have no reason to function well.

This is reflected at all the cancers and other diseases people get as they age.

Bruthal

seamus wrote: »

Care to give any evidence to back up this claim?

If in another 100 years, the average life span is 130, will that be through natural means?

What was the life span at the start of the 20th century, 19th, 18th, 100bc?