Tag: Birth
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Divine birth: Athena, born from her father’s head
Athena (Minerva), the goddess of war and wisdom, had a strange birth. Her father Zeus (Jupiter) had swallowed his pregnant consort Metis (“wisdom”), because he was afraid she would bear a son who would overthrow him. Then he developed a severe headache that nothing would cure. So Hephestos, god of fire and blacksmiths, took an…
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Divine birth: Eve, fashioned from Adam’s rib
It was written in the Bible that it is not good for the man to be alone. So the Lord fashioned from Adam’s rib a companion by an innovative birthing method, as documented in the fresco of Michelangelo. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he…
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How Gargantua was born
“Grandgousier was a jolly good fellow in his day, liking to drink as well as any man in his time, and he was very fond of salty food. . . . When he was of manly age, he was married to Gargamelle, daughter of the King of the Butterflies, a pretty wench with a good…
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Broken water
Erika LundgrinCleveland, Ohio, United States A young girl is sitting in the room, pregnant, water broken, waiting. I know by a quick glance in her chart that we have no information about her in the system. A good history will provide all of the important details of her pregnancy: a small challenge, one I feel…
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Historical contraception: Birth control before “the pill”
Emily DavidsonChapel Hill, United States Since the advent of the birth control pill, birth control advocates claim that women’s control over their reproductive potential increased the proportion of women in the US workforce over the course of the 20th century (Fig 1). Long before the oral contraceptive pill’s emergence, however, women found ways to control…
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Mildred Thornton Stahlman, pioneer in neonatology
Corey ReeseNashville, Tennessee, United States In the 1950s and early 1960s, Mildred Thornton Stahlman, MD, began practicing medicine during a unique period in pediatrics when her chosen subspecialty was in its infancy. She was one of a small group of physicians around the world whose every discovery was new and had a significant impact. Combining a…
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The el-Lahun gynecological papyrus
Chinmoy Bose Kolkata, India The Kahun Gynecological Papyrus (Twelfth Dynasty 1800 BC)1-3 is the oldest available medical record of Egyptian civilization, a three page document one meter long and about thirty-three cm wide that deals with gynecological diseases, fertility, pregnancy, and contraception. The name Amenemhet III was written in the right upper corner behind third page…
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Alexander Gordon and puerperal fever
C. John ScottAberdeen, Scotland The epidemic of childbed (puerperal) fever that struck the city of Aberdeen, Scotland, between December 1789 and March 1792 was unusual. It occurred not in the dirty, crowded, and ill-ventilated wards of lying-in hospitals, but throughout the city and surrounding villages. Serendipitously, one doctor cared for most of the patients. This…