Indiana Medical History Museum

02/07/2020

Identifying the Lost: GPR of Graves at Central State Hospital

Wow! Thank you to everyone who has contributed to our crowd funding campaign! This morning we hit the $3000 point, but we still need another $2500 in donations to reach our goal and bring ground-penetrating radar to the CSH cemetery.

If you haven't already, you can still help by making a contribution through this link. Every donation helps and is much appreciated! You can also help by spreading the word! Thank you!

Help Ball State University raise $5,500 for the project: Identifying the Lost: GPR of Graves at Central State Hospital. Your gift will make a difference!

02/05/2020

One of America’s First Female Pediatricians Saved Lives for 74 Years

"Dr. Leila Denmark lived to be 114, and practiced medicine for three quarters of a century."

Dr. Leila Denmark lived to be 114, and practiced medicine for three quarters of a century

02/04/2020

Today is World Cancer Day.
Every February 4th a global initiative led by the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) works to raise worldwide awareness, improve education, and inspire personal, collective and government action, "re-imagining a world where millions of preventable cancer deaths are saved and access to life-saving cancer treatment and care is equal for all – no matter who you are or where you live."

Cancer isn’t just a health issue but a human issue that touches all of us.

02/03/2020

Please consider making a donation through this link to support our efforts to locate the graves in Section I of the Central State Hospital cemetery this spring using ground penetrating radar (GPR) through the Ball State University Applied Anthropology Laboratories.

You may be aware of a project IMHM has been working on for some time with our partners at IMPD Mounted Patrol, Caroline Scott Harrison Chapter Daughters of the American Revolution, and Ball State University Anthropology and Applied Anthropology Laboratories to properly memorialize the patients who are buried in the oldest section of Central State Hospital's cemetery.

In 2014 we worked with others in the community to clean up Sections II, III, and IV of the cemetery and replace the old marker that was falling apart, but the graves in Section I have long been lost. Those patients, who died at the hospital up until 1905, deserve to be memorialized, too. Their humanity and their suffering deserve to be acknowledged. And their memories deserve respect.

Identifying where these burials are so they can be respectfully marked is an important step in this larger effort to create a welcoming an beautiful green space for the community to reflect on and celebrate these lives and the lives of all people, past and present, who are affected by mental illness.

UPDATE: The link didn't post, it seems, but you can find it in the comments below or copy and past https://crowdfunding.bsu.edu/project/18945

02/02/2020

This Jigsaw Puzzle Was Given to Ellis Island Immigrants to Test Their Intelligence

Similar puzzles were used at Larue D. Carter Memorial Hospital and others in Indiana. They are now preserved in our psychiatric and IQ testing collection at the Indiana Medical History Museum.

A confusing set of blocks could seal their fate

02/01/2020

An escaped slave was the 'Florence Nightingale’ of Indiana's Civil War regiment

"Lucy Higgs Nichols went from a life of slavery to a life of serving others by choice. The former slave turned Civil War nurse was so beloved by soldiers that they called her “Aunt Lucy” and would care for her until the day she died."

Lucy Higgs Nichols was so beloved by the soldiers, they cared for her until she died. A special act of Congress gave her a pension.

01/31/2020

Vacant For Decades, Cook County Hospital’s Transformation Into Hotel, Medical Offices Nearly Complete

"Cook County Hospital first opened in 1857 and was used as a teaching hospital by Rush Medical School. The hospital, designed by architect Paul Gerhardt, was rebuilt in 1914. It closed after it was replaced by Stroger Hospital of Cook County in 2002...The renovated building will also feature a museum paying tribute to the hospital’s legacy..."

PHOTOS: Take a look inside the $1 billion renovation, which will bring a Hyatt hotel, medical offices, a food hall and more to Harrison Street.

01/30/2020

How Upton Sinclair’s 'The Jungle' Unintentionally Spurred Food Safety Laws

"When Upton Sinclair set out to write his 1906 novel The Jungle, he was trying to bring attention to the dismal living and working conditions for immigrants working in the meatpacking industry. Instead, his novel inspired a national movement for food safety."

Muckraker journalist Upton Sinclair started a national movement for food safety after the publication of his 1906 novel, The Jungle, although that wasn't his aim. “I aimed at the public's heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach,” he said.

01/29/2020

Ten women in science you should know

“...despite challenges of gender discrimination and lack of recognition in the scientific community, countless inspiring women in these fields have made historic contributions to science and helped advance understanding of the world around us. Many were not recognized in their own lifetimes, but their achievements have helped generations of female scientists to come.”

Countless inspiring women have made historic contributions to science. Here are the stories of Alice Ball, Grace Hopper, Tu Youyou and others you should know.

01/28/2020

Rabies' horrifying symptoms inspired folktales of humans turned into werewolves, vampires and other monsters

Rabies’ horrifying symptoms inspired folktales of humans turned into werewolves, vampires and other monsters

Fear of a disease that seemed to turn people into beasts might have inspired belief in supernatural beings that live on in today's creepy Halloween costumes.

01/27/2020

Medical experiments / History / Auschwitz-Birkenau

75 years ago today the Soviet Army liberated the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland. Among the many atrocities committed by the Nazis were scores of medical research projects using horrifically cruel and deadly experiments on living human beings including thousands of Jews, Poles, Roma (Gypsies), political prisoners, prisoners of war, homosexuals, and Catholic priests.

Please take the time to read about this terrible chapter in our human history. It's difficult to confront, but it's important that we not forget.

Here are a couple of places to start:
The Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum (http://auschwitz.org/en/history/medical-experiments/)

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (https://www.ushmm.org/collections/bibliography/medical-experiments)

The participation of numerous German physicians in criminal medical experiments on concentration camp prisoners was a particularly drastic instance of the trampling of medical ethics. The initiators and facilitators of these experiments were Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler, together with SS-Obergr...

01/23/2020

How Medical Leeches Move From a Welsh Lab to American Hospitals

"the most surprising member of the hospital team lives in an aquarium...waiting for a doctor to write its name—Hirudo verbana—on a prescription."

The toothy, parasitic worms are invaluable in post-surgical wards.

01/23/2020

Come in for a tour today! Our last tour starts at 3 pm.
We are open Wednesday through Saturday from 10 am to 4 pm with tours beginning on the hour. Learn more at https://www.imhm.org/page-403651

01/22/2020

10 unique and quirky museums around the United States

We're excited that we made this USA Today 10 Best list of must see quirky and unique museums in the United States! We're certainly unique....you won't find anything else like the Indiana Medical History Museum in the country!

But stop by today to see for yourself! We're open for drop in tours on the hour Wednesday through Saturday from 10am to 4pm (last tour starts at 3pm.) You can also make an appointment for groups or for tours outside our regular business hours.

You can now visit museums dedicated to everything from ice cream to rattlesnakes.

01/22/2020

Check out the hottest new designs in exam room furniture from the 1946 Aloe Surgical Equipment, Instruments, and Supplies catalog from our collection of historic medical catalogs at the Indiana Medical History Museum.

01/21/2020

Human Body Temperature Is Getting Cooler, Study Finds

"In 1851, a German doctor named Carl Reinhold August Wunderlich took the temperatures of some 25,000 patients in the city of Leipzig and concluded that the average human body temperature sits at 37 degrees Celsius, or 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. Though variations are known to exist from person to person, Wunderlich’s standard remains a benchmark for medical professionals today. But a new study published in eLife suggests that in the United States, at least, average temperatures are going down—a trend that can be observed in medical records spanning more than 150 years."

Our average normal temperature may no longer be 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit

01/20/2020

‘Barbed-wire disease’ during the First World War

"What became known as ‘shell shock’ had a major impact on the way medical experts viewed the consequences of modern warfare for the future of their profession—and for the future of humanity in general."

By Matthew Stibbe ~ Even before the guns fell silent in Northern France and Belgium on November 11, 1918, the prevalence of mental disturbance among young men who experienced artillery bombardment …

01/17/2020

How a Marian University doctor found a medical mystery in Michelangelo's 'David'

"While art historians have studied Michelangelo’s "David" for centuries, it took the eye of a Marian University cardiologist to see something no one else appears to have recorded about the iconic marble sculpture."

Marian University's Dr. Gelfman noticed that the "David" showed signs of heart disease. It was something no one else appears to have noticed.

01/16/2020

Why we still need quarantine

"In the past, the ancient practice of quarantine was often the only tool in the fight against infectious diseases like leprosy and bubonic plague. Even in today’s world of vaccines and antibiotics, quarantine still has a role, as Lizzie Enfield reveals." from the Wellcome Collection

For years, quarantine has been an important measure to curb the spread of infection and avert further deaths. Discover the way it has been used in the past and why it is still necessary today.

01/15/2020

A New Monument Will Celebrate Nellie Bly's Undercover Reporting, Right Where It Happened

A New Monument Will Celebrate Nellie Bly’s Undercover Reporting, Right Where It Happened. The Roosevelt Island artwork will pay homage to her reporting, especially her inside look at a city asylum.

The Roosevelt Island artwork will pay homage to her reporting, especially her inside look at a city asylum.

01/14/2020

The post-war adverts that tried to cure lonely women

"In the 1950s and 60s the British Medical Association produced a monthly magazine for the general public rather than for doctors. With short, accessible medical articles on myriad themes, Family Doctor is a treasure trove for anyone wanting to understand the landscape of health advice in Britain at the time."

Isolated housewives, lonely female office workers: while the 1950s saw the birth of a general concern about them, manufacturers also spotted an opportunity. Find out how advertising promised that products could salve solitude.

01/10/2020

How Medieval Surgeons Shaped Sex and Gender | JSTOR Daily

"Before the thirteenth century, DeVun writes, surgery—which focused on treating growths, wounds, and injuries—was an unregulated business where barbers and others with no formal training, including women as well as men, competed for customers. But, in the middle of the thirteenth century, an elite group of surgeons sought to change this, writing formal textbooks and promoting surgery for a wider variety of ailments."

Our ideas about surgically “correcting” intersex conditions go back to a shift in the profession of surgery seven centuries ago.

01/09/2020

The Story of Ralstonism, One of History's More Bizarre Health Movements

"The Story of Ralstonism, One of History's More Bizarre Health Movements"

At the turn of the last century, author Webster Edgerly advised readers to achieve optimal wellness by never walking in a straight line and never marrying a woman less than 20 years their junior.

01/08/2020

Chinese Health and Hygiene Puzzle Blocks, 1960s

Originally published in Hidden Treasure: The National Library of Medicine, 2011.

By Marta Hanson ~ Originally published in Hidden Treasure: The National Library of Medicine, 2011. In 2005 the National Library of Medicine acquired more than fifteen hundred Chinese public health …

01/07/2020

Tapeworms, arsenic and magic soap: fact-checking history’s weirdest fad diets and weight-loss gimmicks

"It's a time of year when many of us might pen New Year’s resolutions to lead a healthier lifestyle. Writing for BBC History Revealed Dr Michael Mosley – writer, broadcaster and presenter of Trust Me, I’m A Doctor – explores some extreme weight-loss tips from the past, and why you very definitely should not try them at home…"

It's a time of year when many of us might pen New Year’s resolutions to lead a healthier lifestyle. Writing for BBC History Revealed Dr Michael Mosley – writer, broadcaster and presenter of Trust Me, I’m A Doctor – explores some extreme weight-loss tips from the past, and why you very defini...

01/06/2020

The Dark History of Hysteria

Comics on "The Dark History of Hysteria"

Since the beginning of medical science, one diagnosis has prevailed as the main explanation for all female symptoms. It even persists to today.

01/05/2020

Can going to museums, plays and concerts keep you from dying early? A new study weighs in

Makes sense to us!

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01/02/2020

Toxic trends

"These toxic trends might have been dangerous if you bought them, but they could be lethal for the people who had to make them."

The high cost of fashion is not always in the price tag. Sometimes the latest make-up trend or the season's hottest colour conceals something ugly.

01/01/2020

12/31/2019

This is your last chance for 2019! A gift to the Indiana Medical History Museum’s Annual Fund encourages curiosity, discovery, and life long learning. You have the opportunity to help the IMHM continue to intrigue, inspire, and educate.
Donate securely on our website at http://www.imhm.org/donate by midnight tonight to claim your donation for your 2019 taxes.

12/27/2019

Medieval medicine: astrological 'bat books' that told doctors when to treat patients

"In the middle ages, stars were laden with meaning and, with no light pollution in the sky, often easier to see with the naked eye than they are now. Belief in astrology was almost universal. It was generally understood that the planets and stars under which a person is born would exert influence over a person’s health and personality."

A handful of manuscripts remain which give researchers valuable insights into medieval science.

12/26/2019

A gift to the Indiana Medical History Museum’s Annual Fund encourages curiosity, discovery, and life long learning. You have the opportunity to help the IMHM continue to intrigue, inspire, and educate.

If you would like to help preserve and ensure a future for Indiana’s Medical History, you can donate securely online by December 31st at www.imhm.org/donate to claim your donation on your 2019 taxes. Thank you!

12/24/2019

Can your heart grow three sizes? A doctor reads 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas'

It's the perfect time to revisit this 2018 article from IU School of Medicine's Dr. Richard Gunderman.

Dr. Seuss' most famous character has a lot to teach us about heart.

12/23/2019

How forceps permanently changed the way humans are born

"For most of human existence the risks of procreation were severe and terrifying. Everybody knew someone who died from a complicated pregnancy. Everybody knew someone whose baby was born dead. Not only did women face the prospect of birth and death simultaneously, in the absence of contraception, they did so again and again. Until the early 20th century, the probability of dying from childbirth was similar to the probability of a woman dying of breast cancer or a heart attack today."

Childbirth used to be a terrifying ordeal. But women were surrounded by others – mothers, aunts, sisters – who brought love and experience. But midway through the 19th century, this changed.

12/22/2019

We're so grateful to each of you for supporting us in all of the ways you do, and we wish everyone a wonderful holiday season and a happy and healthy new year!

12/21/2019

These memoirs show us the role women had in eradicating smallpox from India

These memoirs show us the role women had in eradicating smallpox from India

Smallpox is the only disease to be eradicated through sustained human effort. Many of these volunteers were women who defied social norms to save lives in India.