Technological Advances Essay Essay Example for Free

Technological Advances Essay Essay This essay is going to take us back to the beginning with how healers viewed the human body in historical times when little was known about the complexity of the human body. It will touch on several points of how technology in the health care system has been viewed as a blessing to some and a burden to others. This essay will also go into detail on several historical perspectives and what these advances in technology have meant for them as well as how the world views these advances. Technological Advances Essay Before there were formal physicians to care for the sick and debilitated there were healers of all shapes and sizes who looked after and treated those around them that fell ill. The complexity of the human body was not fully understood in early times like it is today. According to Douglas 2003, historically healers came in the form of priests, witch doctors, and even magicians. Depending on the religion and culture one lived in determined the exact treatment they would receive for their illness. Some cultures believed in using the earth to heal any ailments one may possess while other believed the use of a priest was necessary to ward off evil within a person causing their sickness (Douglas, 2003). The advances in medicine even up to this point have shed a great deal of light on how the human body works and have allowed for a more organized way of treating the sick. In today’s modern medical world a person acting â€Å"out of sorts† if you will, may be diagnosed with a mental health disorder like schizophrenia instead of being marked as possessed by evil and needing a priest for treatment. The knowledge that has been gained over the years through research on even one organ such as the brain allows for so much more treatment to be given to an individual suffering from a cerebral issue than was available in early times. The problem with this kind of rapid technological burst in this field lies in that other avenues are being pushed to the back burner. What is meant by that is there is a pill for everything these days based on all the research and knowledge gathered. Alternative medicines that offer a less invasive approach seem to be a road that is blocked off anymore when dealing with physicians. They have spent a great deal of time getting educated on what they know and they are not willing to risk it on something alternative. Medical imagining is a well-known and widely used technological advancement in the field of medicine as well the manufacturing and use of antibiotics. Both of these advancements can be attributed to saving a large number of people’s lives over a significant time span. The different types of medical imaging have made it possible for physicians to take a look inside the human body and see problems without doing unnecessary procedures. In the same way antibiotics have been treating infections and preventing unnecessary deaths. Of course all technology cannot be full proof and the medical society is finding that out with the overuse of antibiotics. Today the uses of these medicines are actually leading to additional diseases such as MRSA for example. MRSA stands for Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus which means it is a strain of staph resistant to many antibiotics out there today. Despite how far America has come in the medical field with new knowledge and advancements in technologies there are still mixed reviews from the public as to if these are good advancement or not. If you were to ask a mother whose child was saved by a heart transplant that was impossible to perform merely fifty years ago I am sure she would be over joyed at how far America has come. However if you were to ask a mother whose child happen to be diagnosed with autism around the time of childhood vaccines she may veer in the opposite direction even though according to the CDC there is no solid proof linking the two together at this point. There will always be people on both sides of the spectrum. It is no surprise that the medical field in America is still a rapidly growing industry. The truth to whether these advancements are beneficial or harmful ultimately lie  somewhere in the middle of the spectrum and it really is individual circumstance at this point that determines how this industry is seen. References Concerns about autism (2013, March 29). In Center for disease control and prevention. Retrieved December 21, 2013 Douglas, H. E. (2003). Historical Overview:Evolution of the allied health professions. In Lecca, P. J., Valentines, P.A., and Lyons, K. J. (Ed). Allied health: practice issues and trends in the new millennium. New York: The Hawthorne Press. First human heart transplant (1996-2013). In History. Retrieved December 22, 2013 Levine, N. (2012, April 18). Understanding MRSA infection. In WebMD. Retrieved December 20, 2013