Timeline: Medicine

• 6500 BCE
  First evidence of the surgical procedure of trephination found in France.
• 5000 BCE
  Evidence of the surgical procedure of trephination found in China.
• 2667 BCE - 2648 BCE
  Imhotep in Egypt writes medical texts describing diagnosis and treatment of 100 diseases and 48 injuries.
• c. 1800 BCE
  The Kahun Gynecological Papyrus deals with women's health and contraception.
• c. 1500 BCE
  Saffron used as medicine on the Aegaean island of Thera.
• c. 1050 BCE
  Babylonian "Diagnostic Handbook" is written by the physician Esagil-kin-apli of Borsippa.
• 950 BCE - 1400 BCE
  Evidence of the surgical procedure of trephination found in Mesoamerica.
• 800 BCE - 700 BCE
  Homer's Iliad is composed with mention of medical treatment in Greek warfare.
• 700 BCE
  First Greek medical school opens in Cnidus.
• c. 600 BCE
  Charaka and Sushruta found two schools of Ayurveda.
• c. 460 BCE - c. 370 BCE
  Traditional dates for the life of Hippocrates in Greece, the "father of medicine" and inventor of the Hippocratic Oath for physicians.
• 431 BCE
  The temple to Apollo Medicus is built in Rome.
• 325 BCE - 280 BCE
  Life of Herophilus of Chalcedon, who studied the brain and the nervous system, attributing intelligence to the brain.
• 292 BCE
  The Romans adopt the Greek god of medicine Asclepius by stealing his sacred snake from Epidaurus and setting up a temple on the Tiber Island.
• 219 BCE
  The physician Archagathus of Sparta arrives in Rome.
• c. 1 CE - 50 CE
  Life of Roman physician Scribonius Largus.
• 43 CE
  The physician Scribonius Largus travels to Britain with the entourage of Claudius.
• c. 60 CE - 130 CE
  Life of the physician Soranus of Ephesos.
• 129 CE - c. 216 CE
  Life of the physician Galen of Pergamon.
• c. 830 CE - c. 870 CE
  Hunayn ibn Ishaq translates Galen's works into Arabic.
• c. 1030 CE
  Avicenna writes the Book of Healing and the Canon of Medicine, based on earlier works.
• 14 Nov 1666 CE
  British diarist Samuel Pepys records the first public demonstration of a blood transfusion between two dogs in London by the physician Richard Lower. This was not the first transfusion, however, as Lower had performed one earlier in 1665. The first human-to-human transfusion would come in 1818, performed by Dr. James Blundell.
• 11 May 1751 CE
  The Pennsylvania Hospital is founded by Benjamin Franklin and Dr. Thomas Bond to care for the sick, infirm, and insane of Philadelphia, the oldest public hospital in the United States.
• 14 May 1796 CE
  Edward Jenner administers the first successful smallpox vaccination to 8-year-old James Phipps in Berkeley, England.
• 30 Nov 1803 CE
  The Balmis Expedition (Royal Philanthropic vaccine Expedition) sets out from Spain, led by Dr. Francisco Javier de Balmis, to vaccinate people in Spanish America against smallpox. Edward Jenner had pioneered the vaccine in 1798 and it reached Spain by 1800. The Balmis Expedition was launched to bring the vaccine to Spain's possessions in the New World and is regarded as the first international healthcare expedition in history, saving thousands of lives in the Americas through the vaccine.
• 7 May 1847 CE
  The American Medical Association (AMA) is founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, primarily through the efforts of Dr. Nathan Smith Davis, to promote medical education, scientific advancement in medicine, and higher standards for medical practice.
• 23 Jan 1849 CE
  Elizabeth Blackwell becomes the first woman to earn a medical degree in the United States, graduating at the top of her class from the Geneva Medical College in New York.
• 3 Aug 1859 CE
  The American Dental Association (ADA) is founded at Niagara Falls, New York, by 26 dentists in order to provide support for members of their profession.
• 24 Mar 1882 CE
  Dr. Robert Kock announces his discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium that causes tuberculosis, to the Physiological Society of Berlin. The date is celebrated as World TB Day annually.
• 18 Jul 1892 CE
  The first successful human test of the cholera vaccine is conducted by researcher Waldemar Haffkine who injects himself with the cholera bacterium, suffering mild symptoms, and recovering to report his findings to the Biological Society in Paris on 30 July, establishing the reliability and safety of the cholera vaccine.
• 1895 CE
  X-rays discovered by Wilhelm Röntgen.
• 15 Jul 1910 CE
  Psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin, in his work *General Psychiatry* (also translated as *Clinical Psychiatry*) names Alzheimer's disease after his friend and colleague, neuropathologist and psychiatrist Alois Alzheimer who first identified its primary features in 1906.
• 28 Sep 1928 CE
  Alexander Fleming discovers the mold *Penicillium notatum* at St. Mary's Hospital, London, after returning from vacation and finding a petri dish he had left out had molded in his absence, leading to the development of penicillin, the world's first antibiotic.
• 2 Dec 1982 CE
  Retired dentist Barney Clark of Seattle, Washington, becomes the first person to receive a permanent artificial heart device, implanted by Dr. William C. DeVries at the University of Utah Medical Center. Clark lived for 112 days after surgery, dying in March 1983 from organ failure.