{"id":430,"date":"2011-04-07T20:29:55","date_gmt":"2011-04-07T20:29:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/nouvelle-france\/"},"modified":"2012-04-13T11:25:58","modified_gmt":"2012-04-13T15:25:58","slug":"health-and-medicine","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/daily-life\/health-and-medicine\/","title":{"rendered":"Health and Medicine"},"content":{"rendered":"

All kinds of ailments were part of the daily lives of people in New France, to a greater extent than what we experience today. At that time, the causes of infectious diseases and the means of controlling their devastating effects were not well known. Medical thought and practices had little in common with those of today. Eighteenth-century knowledge about diseases and cures was still based on writings by authors from \u00a0antiquity, and \u00a0mortality rates were very high.<\/p>\n

Physician examining a sample<\/strong>
In the seventeenth century, like today, doctors sometimes used urine samples in diagnosing illness. Unlike today, however, they lacked sophisticated equipment, and quite often microscopes, and had to rely on the naked eye.\r\n
Candlelight Master, A Physician with a Urine Sample, ca. 1620\u20131640, Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford. Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford<\/div>\">\"A<\/a>

Physician examining a sample<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

Settlers nevertheless enjoyed a good medical infrastructure. Every city had its \u201ch\u00f4tel-Dieu,\u201d or hospital. Surgeons, doctors, apothecaries and healers worked together with religious congregations to help care for the settlers. The Crown together with \u00a0Catholic Church, played a major role in providing health care.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

All kinds of ailments were part of the daily lives of people in New France, to a greater extent than what we experience today. At that time, the causes of infectious diseases and the means of controlling their devastating effects were not well known. Medical thought and practices had little in common with those of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"parent":312,"menu_order":8,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/430"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=430"}],"version-history":[{"count":51,"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/430\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2943,"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/430\/revisions\/2943"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historymuseum.ca\/virtual-museum-of-new-france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}