Episodes

Dec. 11, 2020

Ep.46 - Tom Scotland - The Changing Management of Abdominal Wounds During the Great War

Explores the experiences of surgeons and nurses during the 3rd Battle of Ypres in 1917, from casualty clearing stations positioned within 5 miles of the front line.
Nov. 27, 2020

Ep.45 - Noelle Gallagher - Syphilitic Noses In Eighteenth Century British Literature And Art

Dr Noelle Gallagher explores the weird and wonderful cultural life of deformed noses in eighteenth-century British literature and art.
Nov. 13, 2020

Ep.44 - Jane Stevens - Books and Beaks: Doctors’ Fight Against the Plague in Early Modern Europe

Considers continuity and change in the attitudes and advice given by doctors between 1500 and 1700 regarding the plague.
Oct. 30, 2020

Ep.43 - Tracey Jolliffe - Syphilis In The 21st Century

Tracey Jolliffe discusses the science of syphilis in the 21st century.
Oct. 16, 2020

Ep.42 - Vivian Nutton - An Urge to Correct: Andreas Vesalius Revised

Professor Vivian Nutton discusses Vesalius’ activities as reviser and corrector over his career as a Galenic anatomist.
Oct. 2, 2020

Ep.41 - Lisa Smith - Fragments from an Eighteenth-Century Family Scandal

Lisa Smith discusses the tumultuous relationships of the Newdigates and attempts to piece together a shadowy family scandal from the perspectives of father, daughter and son.
Sept. 18, 2020

Ep.40 - Janet Philp - Burke, Now and Then

Janet Philp explores the history around the tale of Edinburgh’s infamous body-snatchers Burke and Hare, and Dr. Knox, the recipient of their shady undertakings.
Sept. 4, 2020

Ep.39 - Sophie Goggins - Prosthetics: From Maker to User

Reviews the history of prosthetics in Edinburgh and emerging technologies that are shaping the field.
Aug. 21, 2020

Ep.38 - John Henderson - Coping With Plague - Public Health And Epidemics

Professor John Henderson argues that it is time to re-examine and reassess early modern Italian policies dealing with plague.
Aug. 7, 2020

Ep.37 - Jim Mills - Substance Abuse: Past and Present

Considers the changing public perception of drugs such as cannabis and the factors which have influenced its longevity, including immigration, diplomacy, medical science, and politics.
July 24, 2020

Ep.36 - Chris Philo - The Wild and Tranquil Geographies of Animals and Madness

Prof. Chris Philo explores the ‘madness’ of both human and animals.
July 10, 2020

Ep.35 - Anna Dhody - Looking To The Past To Improve Our Future

Anna Dhody talks about the ways scientists are looking to the past to improve our future.
June 26, 2020

Ep.34 - Kristin Hussey - William Harvey, College of Physicians and the Discovery of Circulation

Dr Kristin Hussey discusses William Harvey, one of Britain’s foremost anatomists and discoverer of the circulation of blood.
June 14, 2020

Ep.33 - Gavin Hardy - The Uses of Plants in Medicine in Ancient Greece and Rome

Dr Gavin Hardy discusses the history of plants in medicine during the time of the Ancient Greeks and Romans.
June 10, 2020

Ep.31 - Katie Birkwood - John Dee: Magic, Medicine And The Tudor World

Katie Birkwood explores John Dee’s life story, thoughts and personality, which survive in the personally annotated collection of his books, now residing at the library of the Royal College of Physicians, London.
June 10, 2020

Ep.32 - Martin Willis - Medical Tourism in Victorian Edinburgh

Focuses on an under-represented area of medical history: the depiction of places of medicine in 19th-century travel guides.
June 10, 2020

Ep.30 - Emma Spary - Knowing and Selling Exotic Drugs in Paris c.1700

Considers some of the ways in which lay consumers, merchants and medical experts appropriated and ‘domesticated’ exotic foods and drugs within the French metropolitan world.
June 10, 2020

Ep.29 - Matthew Smith - Food allergy before “allergy”

How were bizarre reactions to food described before the coining of the term ‘allergy’ in 1906? Dr Matthew Smith explains.
June 10, 2020

Ep.28 - Samuel Cohn - ‘The great influenza’ of 1918-20: A plague of compassion

Explores popular reactions to the ‘great influenza’ of 1918-20, primarily in relation to other epidemics of the 19th and early 20th centuries.
June 10, 2020

Ep.27 - James Kennaway - The Piano Plague: The Medical Campaign Against Female Musical Education

For much of the 19th-C there was serious medical discussion about the dangers of excessive music in girls’ education. This examines theories relating to this medical panic and consider motivations behind it.
June 10, 2020

Ep.26 - Mark Harrison - Medical Innovation in the British Empire: The Edinburgh Connection

Medical Innovation in the British Empire: The Edinburgh Connection, by Professor Mark Harrison.
June 10, 2020

Ep.25 - Simon Chaplin - The Heroic Anatomist: 18thc Dissection and the Stoic Ideal

The Heroic Anatomist: 18th Century Dissection and the Stoic Ideal, by Simon Chaplin.
June 10, 2020

Ep.23 - Abigail Woods - Animals And Their Pathologists In London, 1846 - 1900

Reveal the place and purpose of animals within human pathological anatomy during the later 19th century.
June 10, 2020

Ep.24 - David Purdie - What Killed Burns And What Did Not?

"What Killed Burns and What Did Not?" by Professor Emeritus David Purdie.