159 Fun Facts About Medical

Which symbol, a single serpent on a staff, is the predominant symbol of medicine?

The Rod of Asclepius, a single snake coiled on a staff, is the emblem of the Greek god of healing; the two-snake winged caduceus is the frequent mix-up.

The caduceus, wrongly used as a medical symbol, is traditionally the symbol of which god?

The caduceus, a winged staff with two entwined snakes, is the emblem of Hermes, the Greek messenger god; the US Army Medical Corps adopted it in 1902 by mistake.

Hippocrates was born on which Greek island?

Hippocrates was born on Kos around 460 BCE; the plane tree called the Tree of Hippocrates in Kos town and the island's Asklepieion commemorate him.

Who wrote the widely used modern version of the Hippocratic Oath in 1964?

He was Academic Dean of Tufts University's medical school.

What does the Latin word 'placebo' mean?

Its negative counterpart, nocebo, means 'I shall harm'.

What is an inert treatment called when the patient expects it to do harm?

Nocebo, Latin for 'I shall harm', is the term Walter Kennedy coined in 1961 for ill effects produced by an inert treatment when the patient expects harm.

Aspirin's precursor salicin comes from the bark of which tree?

Willow bark's salicin is metabolized in the gut into salicylic acid, the medicinally active compound.

Which company was selling Aspirin globally by 1899?

Bayer chemist Felix Hoffmann made pure acetylsalicylic acid in 1897, and Bayer registered the Aspirin trademark in 1899, selling it worldwide.

Children with viral infections are not given aspirin because of the risk of which condition?

Reye syndrome, a rare swelling of the liver and brain, is linked to aspirin given to children recovering from viral infections such as influenza or chickenpox.

Paracetamol is sold in the US under which brand name?

Tylenol is the US brand of acetaminophen, the American name for paracetamol; in Britain the same drug is sold as Panadol.

Ibuprofen was discovered in 1961 by researchers at which British company?

Stewart Adams and John Nicholson first sold it as Brufen.

Friedrich Sertürner named the opium alkaloid he isolated in 1804 after which Greek god?

Morphine takes its name from Morpheus, the Greek god of dreams, for its sleep-inducing effect; Friedrich Sertürner isolated it from opium in 1804.

Statins lower cholesterol by inhibiting which enzyme?

Statins such as atorvastatin and simvastatin block HMG-CoA reductase, the rate-limiting enzyme of cholesterol synthesis in the liver.

Warfarin first came into large-scale commercial use in 1948 as what?

Warfarin went on sale in 1948 as a rat poison; its anticoagulant effect had been traced to mouldy sweet clover that made cattle bleed to death in the 1920s.

Which US president was treated with warfarin after a highly publicised heart attack?

Dwight Eisenhower was given warfarin after his September 1955 heart attack, which helped the drug, sold as Coumadin, gain acceptance as a human anticoagulant.

Pfizer discovered sildenafil, later Viagra, in 1989 while looking for a treatment for what?

Pfizer synthesised sildenafil in 1989 as a candidate angina drug; trial volunteers reported erections, and it was approved as Viagra for erectile dysfunction in 1998.

Which bacterium produces the neurotoxin behind Botox, the deadliest known natural substance?

Clostridium botulinum produces botulinum toxin, the most lethal toxin known by weight; Botox is a heavily diluted preparation of its type A toxin.

Botulism was first linked in early-1800s Württemberg to poisoning from what food?

Blood sausage was the culprit: at Wildbad, Württemberg, in 1793 thirteen people fell ill and six died after eating one made from pork stomach; Justinus Kerner later studied the 'sausage poison'.

Epinephrine, the fight-or-flight hormone, is produced mainly by which glands?

The adrenal glands, one atop each kidney, make epinephrine (adrenaline) in their inner medulla; it raises heart rate and blood sugar for the fight-or-flight response.

Who was the first to use penicillin successfully in a patient, treating an eye infection in 1930?

Cecil George Paine, a Sheffield pathologist who had studied under Fleming, cured eye infections with crude penicillin filtrate in 1930, the first recorded clinical use.

The word insulin comes from the Latin for what?

Insulin comes from the Latin insula, 'island', because it is secreted by the islets of Langerhans, the clusters of beta cells in the pancreas.

Metformin was introduced as a diabetes medicine in France in which year?

Metformin was launched in France in 1957 as Glucophage after Jean Sterne's trials; it descends from guanidine research on goat's rue, or French lilac.

Who first used the term 'antibiotic' in 1942?

Selman Waksman coined 'antibiotic' in 1942 for microbial substances that kill other microbes; his lab's discovery of streptomycin earned him the 1952 Nobel Prize.

Who brought smallpox inoculation from Turkey to Britain in 1721?

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu saw variolation in Constantinople and had her daughter inoculated in London in 1721; Jenner's cowpox vaccine followed 75 years later.

Which form of diabetes is the most common?

Type 2 diabetes accounts for roughly 90% of cases worldwide; it involves insulin resistance, whereas the rarer type 1 is an autoimmune loss of insulin-producing cells.

The word 'asthma' comes from a Greek word meaning what?

Asthma comes from the Greek ásthma, meaning 'panting'; Hippocratic writers used it for any laboured breathing before it named the specific airway disease.

Under the 2017 ACC/AHA guideline, what blood pressure begins stage 2 hypertension?

Under the 2017 ACC/AHA guideline, stage 2 hypertension is 140/90 mmHg or above; stage 1 spans 130–139/80–89, and 'elevated' is 120–129 systolic with diastolic under 80.

What is the most common cause of a heart attack?

Rupture of an atherosclerotic plaque in a coronary artery, triggering a clot that blocks blood flow, causes most heart attacks; about 15.9 million occurred worldwide in 2015.

What is a stroke whose symptoms last less than 24 hours called?

A transient ischemic attack, or mini-stroke, is a brief blockage of blood flow to the brain whose symptoms resolve within 24 hours, often within an hour.

The word 'cancer' comes from the ancient Greek for which animal?

Hippocrates and Galen likened tumours with swollen veins to crabs.

Tuberculosis was historically known by which name?

Consumption was the old name for tuberculosis, from the way it wasted the body; in the 1800s it caused an estimated quarter of all adult deaths in Europe.

Which vaccine protects against tuberculosis?

BCG, the bacillus Calmette-Guérin vaccine, was first given to a human in 1921 and protects chiefly against severe childhood tuberculosis.

Malaria is spread by the bite of which mosquito genus?

Anopheles mosquitoes carry malaria; only infected females, which need blood to make eggs, transmit the Plasmodium parasites.

How many species of Plasmodium commonly infect humans?

Five Plasmodium species cause human malaria: falciparum, vivax, ovale, malariae and the monkey parasite knowlesi; symptoms usually begin 10 to 15 days after the bite.

AIDS was first recognised by which agency in 1981?

The US Centers for Disease Control first reported the syndrome on 5 June 1981, describing Pneumocystis pneumonia in five previously healthy young men in Los Angeles.

How many types of influenza virus are there?

There are four influenza virus types, A, B, C and D; A and B cause seasonal flu, C causes mild illness, and D, identified in 2011, mainly infects cattle.

What are the small white marks inside the mouth in early measles called?

Koplik spots, tiny white lesions on the inner cheek described by Henry Koplik in 1896, appear two to three days before the measles rash.

As of 2023, wild poliovirus remained endemic in only Afghanistan and which other country?

Pakistan and Afghanistan were the last two countries with endemic wild poliovirus in 2023; Africa, including Nigeria, was certified free of wild polio in August 2020.

Albert Sabin's polio vaccine differed from Salk's in what way?

The oral vaccine strain replicates in the gut but not nerve tissue.

What is the name of the induced-coma treatment occasionally used for symptomatic rabies?

The Milwaukee protocol, an induced coma plus antivirals devised by Rodney Willoughby in 2004 for teenager Jeanna Giese, is a rarely successful last resort for symptomatic rabies.

Tetanus is also commonly known as what?

Lockjaw is the common name for tetanus because spasm of the jaw muscles is often the first sign; 'tetanus' itself comes from the Greek for stretched or taut.

What is the fixed facial spasm of tetanus called?

Risus sardonicus, a fixed grin from spasm of the facial muscles, is a classic sign of tetanus; trismus (lockjaw) usually comes first and opisthotonus arches the back.

Which bacterium causes cholera?

Vibrio cholerae, a comma-shaped bacterium, causes cholera; Filippo Pacini described it in Florence in 1854 and Robert Koch isolated it in pure culture in 1883–84.

Leprosy is also called Hansen's disease after a physician of which nationality?

Gerhard Armauer Hansen, a Norwegian physician working in Bergen, identified Mycobacterium leprae in 1873, and leprosy has carried his name since.

Which unusual research animal can be used to grow the leprosy bacterium?

The nine-banded armadillo, whose low body temperature suits Mycobacterium leprae, is used to grow the bacterium, which cannot be cultured in laboratory media.

Scurvy is caused by a lack of what?

Vitamin C (ascorbic acid) deficiency causes scurvy; bleeding gums and fatigue appear after at least a month without it, since the body cannot make the vitamin.

James Lind's 1747 scurvy experiment is remembered as one of the first what?

James Lind's 1747 trial aboard HMS Salisbury, giving twelve scurvy sailors six different treatments, is remembered as one of the first controlled clinical trials; the two on oranges and lemons recovered.

Rickets is usually caused by a lack of what?

Vitamin D deficiency, often from too little sunlight, causes rickets by impairing calcium absorption, so children's growing bones soften and bow.

Gout results from needle-shaped crystals of which substance in the joints?

Uric acid, a breakdown product of purines, forms needle-shaped monosodium urate crystals in joints, classically the big toe, triggering gout's painful attacks.

Which condition was historically nicknamed 'the disease of kings'?

Gout was called the disease of kings because its attacks were associated with rich meat, seafood and alcohol that only the wealthy could afford.

Pertussis is also known by what name because of how long its symptoms can last?

Pertussis is called the 100-day cough, a name from its Chinese description, because the violent coughing fits can persist for weeks or months; Bordetella pertussis causes it.

Chickenpox is caused by which pathogen?

Varicella zoster virus, a herpesvirus, causes chickenpox; it then lies dormant in nerve roots and can reactivate decades later as shingles.

Rubella was first proposed as a disease distinct from measles and scarlet fever in which year?

In 1814 the English physician George de Maton proposed rubella was distinct from measles and scarlet fever; its 'German measles' nickname recalls the 18th-century German doctors who first described it.

Which Ebola outbreak was the first to exceed 10,000 deaths?

The 2013–2016 Western Africa epidemic, centred on Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, caused over 28,000 cases and about 11,300 deaths, far beyond any earlier Ebola outbreak.

Where was the first known case of COVID-19 identified in December 2019?

The disease is caused by SARS-CoV-2.

Sepsis caused roughly what share of deaths worldwide in 2017?

Sepsis was linked to one in five deaths worldwide in 2017: a Lancet study counted about 49 million cases and 11 million deaths, roughly 20% of all deaths that year.

What is the most common blood disorder, affecting a fifth to a third of the world's population?

Anaemia, a shortage of red blood cells or haemoglobin, affects roughly a quarter to a third of people worldwide; iron deficiency is its leading cause.

Haemophilia A is a deficiency of which clotting protein?

Haemophilia A is a deficiency of clotting factor VIII and is the commonest form; haemophilia B, or Christmas disease, involves factor IX.

About what share of sickle cell disease cases occur in sub-Saharan Africa?

About 80% of sickle cell disease cases occur in sub-Saharan Africa, where the trait persists because carriers of one sickle gene are partly protected against malaria.

Besides genetic testing, how is cystic fibrosis diagnosed?

The sweat test diagnoses cystic fibrosis: faulty CFTR protein lets chloride escape into sweat, so a sweat chloride level of 60 mmol/L or more confirms the disease.

Down syndrome is also known as trisomy of which chromosome?

Down syndrome is trisomy 21, an extra copy of chromosome 21; John Langdon Down described the condition in 1866 and Jérôme Lejeune identified the extra chromosome in 1959.

Parkinson's disease involves loss of dopamine-producing neurons in which brain region?

Parkinson's disease destroys dopamine-producing neurons in the substantia nigra, a dark-pigmented midbrain region; levodopa, a dopamine precursor, is the usual first treatment.

In multiple sclerosis the immune system attacks what?

It is a demyelinating disease.

The word 'epilepsy' comes from a Greek word meaning what?

Epilepsy comes from the Greek epilambanein, 'to seize' or take hold of, from the ancient belief that seizures were a seizing by spirits; about 50 million people worldwide have it.

About what share of migraine sufferers experience an aura?

Auras are reversible, often visual disturbances lasting 5 to 60 minutes.

What did Karl Landsteiner originally call the blood group now known as O?

His 1901 classification was A/B/C.

What is the gap between the systolic and diastolic readings called?

Pulse pressure is the difference between the systolic and diastolic readings, about 40 mmHg for a healthy adult at 120/80.

Who invented the binaural (two-eared) stethoscope in 1851?

Arthur Leared, an Irish physician, invented the binaural stethoscope in 1851; George Cammann refined it for commercial production in 1852, and Laennec's 1816 original was a single tube.

Who introduced the easily usable blood-pressure cuff in 1896?

Scipione Riva-Rocci, an Italian physician, introduced the inflatable arm-cuff sphygmomanometer in 1896; Harvey Cushing brought one to the US and popularised it.

At what rate per minute should chest compressions be given in adult CPR?

Compressions should be 5 to 6 cm deep.

Where was the first fully implantable pacemaker placed in a human, on 8 October 1958?

Rune Elmqvist designed it and Åke Senning implanted it.

Why did Röntgen put an 'X' in the name of his 1895 discovery?

Röntgen chose X to signify an unknown type of ray, as x stands for an unknown in mathematics; in German and many other languages they are named Röntgen rays after him.

Godfrey Hounsfield shared the 1979 Nobel Prize for the CT scanner with which physicist?

Allan MacLeod Cormack, a South African-born physicist at Tufts, shared the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Godfrey Hounsfield for developing computer-assisted tomography.

Which physician was inspired to pioneer endoscopy by watching sword swallowers?

Adolf Kussmaul performed the first gastroscopy in 1868 on a sword swallower, whose ability to pass a rigid tube without gagging had inspired him.

Which organ is the second most commonly transplanted worldwide?

Hearts come third.

Which physician-poet suggested the word 'anesthesia' to William Morton after his 1846 ether demonstration?

Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., physician and poet, proposed 'anaesthesia' in a November 1846 letter to William Morton; the Greek root means 'without sensation'.

Who coined the nickname 'laughing gas' for nitrous oxide?

Humphry Davy coined 'laughing gas' around 1799 after inhaling nitrous oxide at the Pneumatic Institution in Bristol and describing its euphoria; Horace Wells later used it for dentistry in 1844.

Who developed an inhaler to regulate chloroform dosage in 1848?

John Snow designed an inhaler in 1848 that regulated chloroform dosage; he later gave chloroform to Queen Victoria at the birth of Prince Leopold in 1853.

Who allegedly performed the first C-section in which both mother and child survived, in 1500?

Jacob Nufer's feat was not recorded until eight decades later.

Which Greek physician used the word onkos, root of 'oncology', for all tumours?

Galen, the Greek physician of the Roman empire (c. 129–216 CE), used onkos, 'mass' or 'swelling', for tumours, the root of 'oncology'; Hippocrates had used karkinos for cancer.

The word 'pediatrics' comes from Greek words meaning what?

Pediatrics means 'healer of children', from the Greek pais (child) and iatros (healer or doctor); the specialty took shape in the 19th century.

Who coined the term 'psychiatry' in 1808?

Johann Christian Reil, a German physician, coined 'Psychiaterie' in 1808; it combines Greek psyche (soul) and iatros (healer), the medical treatment of the soul.

What does the specialty abbreviation ENT stand for?

ENT stands for ear, nose and throat; the specialty's formal name, otorhinolaryngology, strings together the Greek for those three organs.

Podiatry is the branch of medicine devoted to which part of the body?

US podiatric schools teach foot and ankle surgery.

Nephrology is the study of which organ?

Nephrology, from the Greek nephros, 'kidney', is the specialty dealing with kidney disease, dialysis and transplantation.

Hepatology deals with the liver, gallbladder, biliary tree and which other organ?

It is often a subspecialty of gastroenterology.

Which inherited disorder is known as brittle bone disease?

Osteogenesis imperfecta, or brittle bone disease, is an inherited defect of type I collagen that makes bones fracture easily; many affected people have blue-tinged whites of the eyes.

Rheumatology takes its name from a Greek word meaning what?

Rheumatology comes from the Greek rheuma, a flowing current or stream, from the ancient belief that a flowing humour caused joint pain; inflammation of joints and connective tissue unites the field.

'Immunity' comes from the Latin immunis, meaning what?

Immunis is Latin for 'exempt', originally from public duties or taxes; the word was applied to freedom from disease by the 19th century.

Epidemiology literally means the study of which phrase?

Epidemiology comes from Greek epi (upon), demos (people) and logos (study): the study of that which is upon the people; Hippocrates titled a treatise 'Epidemics'.

The World Health Organization was established on which date in 1948?

The WHO constitution came into force on 7 April 1948, a date marked each year as World Health Day; it is headquartered in Geneva with six regional offices.

How many Nobel Peace Prizes had the International Committee of the Red Cross won by 1970?

By 1970 the ICRC had won three Nobel Peace Prizes, in 1917, 1944 and 1963; the 1963 award was shared with the League of Red Cross Societies.

Médecins Sans Frontières was founded in 1971 in the aftermath of which crisis?

Médecins Sans Frontières was founded in Paris in December 1971 by French doctors and journalists angered by the Biafran famine of 1967–70; it won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1999.

Which Pittsburgh operation, founded in 1967, was the first US civilian EMS staffed by paramedics?

Freedom House Ambulance Service, started in Pittsburgh's Hill District in 1967 with Peter Safar's training programme, staffed its ambulances mostly with Black paramedics.

Ambulances were first used for emergency transport in 1487 by which army?

The Spanish army of Ferdinand and Isabella used wagons to carry the wounded at the 1487 siege of Málaga, the first recorded use of ambulances for emergency transport.

The word 'hospital' comes from the Latin hospes, meaning what?

Hospes is Latin for a stranger or guest (and also a host); the same root gives hospice, hostel, hotel and hospitality.

In which Minnesota city did William Worrall Mayo settle in 1864, founding what became the Mayo Clinic?

William Worrall Mayo settled in Rochester, Minnesota, in 1864 as a Civil War examining surgeon; his sons Will and Charlie built the group practice into the Mayo Clinic.

Johns Hopkins Hospital, opened in 1889, is considered the birthplace of which medical traditions?

Johns Hopkins Hospital is credited as the birthplace of rounds, residents and house staff, the training model William Osler built there; its founder's $7 million bequest was then the largest in US history.

Which author donated the copyright of his most famous work to Great Ormond Street Hospital?

J. M. Barrie gave the rights to Peter Pan to Great Ormond Street Hospital in 1929; the hospital had opened in 1852 as England's first to offer in-patient beds for children.

Where was Britain's National Health Service officially launched in 1948?

The NHS was launched at Park Hospital, Davyhulme, on 5 July 1948, where the Health Minister symbolically received its keys; it was later renamed Trafford General Hospital.

Whom did Clement Attlee appoint Health Minister in 1945 to build the NHS?

Aneurin Bevan, Attlee's Minister of Health from 1945, steered the National Health Service Act through Parliament in 1946 and launched the service on 5 July 1948, free at the point of use.

Which institution is regarded as medieval Europe's first medical school?

The Schola Medica Salernitana in southern Italy, active from the 10th century and flourishing in the 11th to 13th, is regarded as medieval Europe's first medical school; Trota of Salerno practised there.

The prescription symbol Rx comes from the Latin word recipe, meaning what?

Recipe is the Latin imperative 'take' ('take thou'), which headed medieval prescriptions listing ingredients to be compounded; the symbol Rx abbreviates it.

From what body mass index upward is an adult classed as obese?

A BMI of 30 or more is obese; Adolphe Quetelet devised the index's basis between 1830 and 1850.

Below what core temperature does hypothermia set in?

Hypothermia is a core body temperature below 35 °C; normal is about 37 °C, and mild hypothermia (32–35 °C) brings shivering and confusion.

Who first identified cholesterol in solid form in gallstones in 1769?

François Poulletier de la Salle first identified cholesterol in solid form in gallstones in 1769; Michel Eugène Chevreul named the substance 'cholesterine' in 1815.

The most common type of stone formed in the urinary tract is made of what?

Calcium oxalate stones are the most common urinary stones, with calcium-based stones about 80% of cases; Sushruta described surgery for bladder stones as early as 600 BC.

The word 'hernia' comes from the Latin for what?

Hernia is Latin for 'rupture'; it describes an organ pushing through a weak spot in the surrounding muscle wall, most commonly in the inguinal (groin) region.

Who performed the celebrated 1735 appendectomy at St George's Hospital, London?

Claudius Amyand removed the appendix of 11-year-old Hanvil Anderson at St George's Hospital, London, on 6 December 1735, the operation long cited as the first successful appendectomy.

Tonsillectomy has been described since at least 50 AD by which Roman writer?

Aulus Cornelius Celsus described tonsil removal in De Medicina around AD 30–50; the operation became a routine treatment for recurrent tonsillitis in the 20th century.

The first alkylating chemotherapy agents were derived from what?

Nitrogen mustards include cyclophosphamide and chlorambucil.

Diazepam, patented by Hoffmann-La Roche in 1959, is better known by which brand name?

Valium is Roche's brand of diazepam, launched in 1963; it was the best-selling medication in the United States from 1968 to 1982.

Which Australian re-established lithium as a psychiatric medicine in 1948?

John Cade, a Melbourne psychiatrist, gave lithium to his first manic patient in 1948 and published the results in 1949, launching its use for bipolar disorder.

Prozac is the brand name of which drug?

Prozac is Eli Lilly's brand of fluoxetine, approved in the US in December 1987 and the first SSRI antidepressant to gain mass popularity.

Who received the first Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, in 1901?

Emil von Behring won the first Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1901 for serum therapy against diphtheria; Ronald Ross followed in 1902 for malaria.

Who was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, in 1947?

Gerty Cori shared the 1947 prize with her husband Carl for discovering how glycogen is broken down and resynthesised, the Cori cycle.

Who created the first modern hospice, in 1967?

Dame Cicely Saunders, a British nurse turned social worker and doctor, founded St Christopher's Hospice in London in 1967, the first modern hospice.

The word 'triage' comes from a French verb meaning what?

Triage comes from the French trier, 'to sort'; Napoleon's surgeon Dominique Jean Larrey applied sorting by urgency to battlefield casualties in the early 1800s.

The Apgar score was developed in 1952 by a physician of what specialty?

Virginia Apgar, an anesthesiologist at Columbia University, devised her newborn score in 1952; it rates appearance, pulse, grimace, activity and respiration.

What is the highest possible Glasgow Coma Scale score?

The Glasgow Coma Scale runs from 3 to 15, summing eye (4), verbal (5) and motor (6) responses; 15 is fully alert and 3 is complete unresponsiveness.

The letters on an eye chart are formally known as what?

Optotypes are the standardised letters or symbols on an eye chart; Herman Snellen introduced them with his chart in 1862, with strokes one-fifth of the letter height.

Louis Braille developed his code in 1824 as an improvement on what?

Charles Barbier had devised the tactile night-writing code.

Who invented the first lightweight folding steel wheelchair in 1933?

Everest was Jennings's disabled engineer friend.

What was the first electric hearing aid, built in the late 1890s, called?

Miller Reese Hutchison created the Akouphone, the first electric hearing aid, in 1898; it used a carbon transmitter to amplify sound and was bulky table-top equipment.

Who fabricated the first successful scleral contact lens in 1888?

Adolf Gaston Eugen Fick, a German ophthalmologist, made the first successful scleral contact lenses from blown glass in 1888, testing them on rabbits, then himself.

The first spectacles were developed in the second half of the 13th century where?

The first spectacles appeared in northern Italy around 1286, most likely in Pisa, as convex lenses for reading; Benjamin Franklin's bifocals came in the 1780s.

Earle Dickson invented the Band-Aid in 1920 for whom?

He rose to vice president of Johnson & Johnson.

Which is the smallest and lightest bone in the human body?

The stapes, Latin for 'stirrup', is the smallest bone in the body at about 3 mm long; it sits in the middle ear between the incus and the oval window.

Which is the longest bone in the human body?

The femur, or thigh bone, is the longest and strongest bone in the body, roughly a quarter of a person's height.

Which is the largest organ of the human body?

The skin is the body's largest organ, covering about 1.5 to 2 square metres in an adult and making up roughly 15% of body weight.

What resting heart-rate range is considered normal for an adult?

A normal adult resting heart rate is 60 to 100 beats per minute; below 60 is bradycardia and above 100 tachycardia, though trained athletes often rest below 60.

Which lung is bigger, and why?

Together they weigh about 1.3 kilograms.

The cornea accounts for roughly what share of the eye's optical power?

The cornea provides about two-thirds of the eye's focusing power, roughly 43 of 60 dioptres, with the lens supplying the rest.

Which people have the highest rate of twinning in the world?

The Yoruba of southwest Nigeria have the world's highest twinning rate, about 45 twin births per 1,000; a yam-rich diet containing phytoestrogens is one suggested cause.

Which IVF pioneer received the Nobel Prize in 2010?

Robert Edwards won the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for developing IVF; his collaborator Patrick Steptoe had died in 1988, and Louise Brown, the first IVF baby, was born in July 1978.

In which year was the first oral contraceptive pill approved by the US FDA?

The FDA approved Enovid, the first oral contraceptive, on 9 May 1960; by 1965 some 6.5 million American women were using the pill.

A baby is preterm if born before how many weeks of gestation?

Preterm birth is delivery before 37 completed weeks of gestation; full term is around 40 weeks, and births before 28 weeks are classed as extremely preterm.

The Pap smear is named after a physician of which nationality?

Georgios Papanikolaou, a Greek physician working at Cornell, developed the cervical smear in the 1920s; the test's short name comes from his.

Which two countries have the world's highest rates of melanoma?

Australia and New Zealand have the world's highest melanoma rates, as largely fair-skinned populations of European descent live under intense sunlight.

Non-Hodgkin lymphoma makes up roughly what share of lymphoma cases?

Non-Hodgkin lymphomas make up about 90% of lymphoma cases, with Hodgkin lymphoma the remaining tenth; Epstein-Barr virus is a risk factor for the Hodgkin type.

The medical term 'metastasis' is Greek for what?

Metastasis is Greek for 'displacement' or removal, from meta (beyond, change) and stasis (placing); in medicine it names cancer's spread to distant organs.

'Malignancy' comes from Latin words meaning what?

Badly born: Latin male, 'badly', and -gnus, 'born', describe a condition's tendency to become progressively worse.

The word 'syndrome' derives from a Greek word meaning what?

Syndrome comes from the Greek syndromē, 'concurrence' or running together, from syn (with) and dromos (running): a set of signs and symptoms that occur together.

The word 'prognosis' comes from Greek for what?

Prognosis is Greek for 'fore-knowing', from pro (before) and gnosis (knowledge); Hippocratic writings urged physicians to foretell a disease's course.

Physicians adopted the white coat to represent themselves as what?

Physicians adopted the white coat in the late 1800s to present themselves as scientists, borrowing the laboratory's most recognisable garment and distancing medicine from quackery.

Where did Banting and Best isolate insulin in John Macleod's laboratory?

Banting and Best isolated insulin at the University of Toronto in 1921; Banting shared the 1923 Nobel Prize with Macleod and split his prize money with Best, who had been left out.

English physician William Harvey's 1628 treatise De Motu Cordis set out his discovery of what?

The circulation of the blood drew such criticism from fellow physicians that Harvey 'fell mightily in his practice'; the book was published in Frankfurt.

The words 'vaccine' and 'vaccination' come from Jenner's Latin term Variolae vaccinae, meaning what?

Variolae vaccinae means 'pustules (smallpox) of the cow', from the Latin vacca, cow; Jenner's 1798 Inquiry used the term for the cowpox he inoculated to protect against smallpox.

By what nickname is Ignaz Semmelweis, the pioneer of hand-washing in obstetrics, known?

Ignaz Semmelweis is remembered as 'the saviour of mothers': his 1847 rule of hand-washing in chlorinated lime cut childbed-fever deaths on his maternity ward from about 18% to around 1%, yet colleagues rejected him.

Where in London did Florence Nightingale establish her nursing school in 1860?

The Nightingale Training School opened at St Thomas' Hospital on 9 July 1860, the first secular nursing school in the world and the foundation of professional nursing.

What is the title of Andreas Vesalius's landmark 1543 work on human anatomy?

De Humani Corporis Fabrica (On the Fabric of the Human Body), printed in Basel in 1543, overturned Galenic anatomy; that year Vesalius also articulated a felon's skeleton there, his only surviving preparation.

Louise Brown, the first IVF baby, was delivered in 1978 at the general hospital of which town?

Louise Brown was born by caesarean at Oldham General Hospital on 25 July 1978, weighing 5 lb 12 oz; her sister Natalie, born in 1982, was the world's 40th IVF baby.

Semmelweis made his hand-washing discoveries at the First Obstetrical Clinic of which institution?

Semmelweis worked at Vienna General Hospital, appointed assistant to Professor Johann Klein on 1 July 1846; comparing its two maternity clinics led him to hand-washing in 1847.

At which hospital did Joseph Lister introduce carbolic acid as a surgical steriliser?

Joseph Lister introduced carbolic acid at Glasgow Royal Infirmary from 1865, using the phenol solution on instruments, wounds and dressings and establishing the principle of antisepsis.

Who received the first human-to-human heart transplant, performed by Christiaan Barnard in 1967?

Louis Washkansky, a 54-year-old grocer, received Denise Darvall's heart at Groote Schuur Hospital on 3 December 1967; he regained consciousness but died of pneumonia 18 days later.

In which year did Ibn Sina (Avicenna) complete The Canon of Medicine?

1025 saw him finish the five-book encyclopedia in Hamadan, having begun it in Gorganj and continued in Rey.

In which year did Willem Einthoven win the Nobel Prize for the mechanism of the electrocardiogram?

Willem Einthoven won the 1924 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the electrocardiogram; his string galvanometer of 1901–03 made the first practical recordings.

From what did Alexander Fleming discover the enzyme lysozyme in 1922?

Fleming found lysozyme in 1922 in his own nasal discharge while suffering a cold; alongside it he described the bacterium Micrococcus lysodeikticus, six years before penicillin.

What name did Paul Lauterbur give his 1973 gradient-based method that led to MRI?

Lauterbur called his 1973 technique zeugmatography, from the Greek zeugma, 'that which joins', because magnetic field gradients join spatial position to NMR frequency; the name did not catch on.