Father of Medicine or Father of Mental Health Awareness? Who Was Hippocrates?
- Yukta Shah
- Apr 2, 2022
- 4 min read
The father of all medicine, the man who healed thousands, Hippocrates. Born in 460 BCE, Hippocrates is often thought of as the man who set the foundation for medicine; a “primer” for its building blocks. What people often ignore, however, is Hippocrates’ impact on the mental health industry.
Hippocrates was born into a relatively wealthy family, allowing him to receive a good education and early life. Although there are no official records of this, we assume that as a young adult, Hippocrates was an apprentice under his father in order to study medicine. As his career progressed, Hippocrates continued pursuing the medical field. In adulthood, it is believed that Hippocrates healed a great number of people from diseases. Although this is not backed by sufficient historical evidence, legend has it that Hippocrates even healed the then King of Macedonia of tuberculosis. Hippocrates was not just any old physician bound by the medical laws he had been taught; however, he was also a philosopher. It is this “philosopher side” of him that we today thank for the awareness it brought for mental health.
Before Hippocrates, most of the world’s population looked at mental health as a state of simple “insanity,” which one could not escape from. Mental illnesses and “insanity” were viewed as purely supernatural occurrences which could not be easily fixed by the work of human hands and practicing physicians. Some thought it was better to leave mental health problems in the hands of God, others tried torturous treatments to force evil spirits out of the body.
During this time, Hippocrates was a young aspiring doctor and philosopher whose medical actions and theories proved him interested in pursuing biological matters that affected the human population. Hippocrates often presented these theories and medical knowledge through writing. Written over 70 medical journals and books, Hippocrates attracted physician readers, pharmacists, and even the general public who did not study medicine. The Hippocratic Corpus is a collection of over 60 medical works, theories and supposed treatments that are all related to Hippocrates’ beliefs. Hippocrates has even been credited for writing parts of this Hippocratic Corpus. In fact, the Hippocratic Corpus is where he introduced his readers to the Humoral Theory. This peculiar theory was Hippocrates’ way of uncovering the cause of biological illnesses. The Humoral Theory stated that the human body was made up of four separate humors, black bile, yellow bile, blood, and phlegm. Hippocrates stated that an imbalance in any of these humors could lead to illnesses. Hippocrates thought that by introducing the Humoral Theory, he could make the inexplicable, explicable. Although today we know that his theory is wrong in many ways, the light Hippocrates brought to mental health through his Hippocratic Corpus, are what we are fascinated by.
Figure 2 : The Hippocratic Corpus (udayton.edu)
In the past, mental illnesses were disregarded and looked down upon by the general population. Any “insanity” was thought to have no real relation to biological matters or any connection to the physical human body. Mental issues were justified by supernatural reasons. Perhaps it was because of the great number of sins that one committed, or perhaps a ghost has taken over this patient's body. Hippocrates dared to cross these boundaries that surrounded mental health at that time. Hippocrates dared to take a step further and announce a connection between mental health and the physical human body. Not only did Hippocrates’ Humoral Theory state that an imbalance of any of the four stated humors could lead to physical illnesses, but also that an imbalance in the black bile could lead to mental pains, or as he wrote, “melancholy.” This “outlandish” theory would have been frowned upon in a time that so heavily relied on religion and God for explanations for any unnatural human or world behavior. Hippocrates was one of the first physicians to separate religious beliefs from medical ones, considering other environmental factors for human ailments. By doing this, he opened the door for the generations succeeding him to create further separation, allowing for new significant discoveries about human health.
Figure 3: Humorism - Wikipedia
Today we remember Hippocrates as both an important figure in the history of medicine and mental health awareness. Without Hippocrates, the first step to connect mental health to more than just supernatural tendencies may have not come for centuries. In medical school graduations, the Hippocratic Oath, is recited as a code of conduct for future medical professionals. If you turn to any physician, psychiatrist, or other medical professional, they will tell you the importance of the Hippocratic Oath and why we remember what he has done to progress the medical and mental health field today.
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