Resumo

HERNANDEZ BOTERO, Johan Sebastián. SEPSIS, FIREARMS AND MICROSCOPES: IMPLICATIONS OF SEPSIS IN THE MEDICINE REVOLUTION IN THE XVI AND XIX CENTURIES. Biosalud [online]. 2010, vol.9, n.2, pp.96-111. ISSN 1657-9550.

The galenic dogma "Pus bonum et laudabile" was the dominant paradigm in wound management for nearly two thousand years and it encouraged the use of treatments that favored the suppuration, which promoted a large number of deaths in hospices and in the battle fields due to sepsis. In this work we will analyze, from a Kuhnian view, the gradual overthrowing process of this dogma, from the impact of the entry of firearms into combat in the fourteenth century and their implications for the development of war surgery, to the birth of the microbiological era in the nineteenth century. The evolution of surgical techniques from debridement to amputation, and how they had a great impact in reducing the incidence and traumatic shock and septic shock mortality, will also be observed. In this framework we will analyze the profound epistemological rupture that occurred due to sepsis in the field of microbiology during the nineteenth century, in addition to the gradual progress that since the sixteenth century have enabled the development of modern surgery. In this way, we will see how all these advancements motivated by sepsis had a profound impact on the development of contemporary medicine.

Palavras-chave : history of medicine; sepsis; history of the 16th century; modern history (1601-1900); traumatic shock; amputation; suppuration; barber surgeon.

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