15 Of The Most Outrageous Medical Treatments In History

Powder of Sympathy was created by Sir Kenelm Digby of the 17th century. The mixture was composed of rust, bits of mummified corpses, earthworms, and pigs’ brains. What was it used to cure? One very specific type of injury: rapier wounds.

Bloodletting was extremely popular for a long time. Different ailments were treated this way, and people thought these ailments were due to having too much blood. It traces back to the idea that the four humors — blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile — needed to stay in balance.

Trepanation has been around forever. It basically involved drilling holes in someone’s head, usually to treat migraines and seizures. As it turns out, trepanation didn’t do much to cure head or brain problems. Go figure.

Modern medical analysis concerning urine has come a long way. Back in the day, doctors would only have their five senses to examine urine samples. This amounted to smelling, touching, and even tasting urine. Some people even bathed in it.

When the Black Death rose to prominence, an unlikely cure was created — farts in a jar. At the time, people thought the Black Death was caused by deadly vapors, so they believed in using “deadly vapors” to fight it. People were encouraged to take a whiff of the jar whenever the illness was near.