AePVII_Feher

Daniella Fehér 1 – Alica Petrovics 1 – Anna Blázovics 1 – Andrea Ferencz 1 – Hedvig Győry, 2
1 Department of Surgical Research and Techniques, Heart and Vascular Centre, Faculty of Medicine, Semmelweis University ● 2 HEFS AEC and Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest, Hungary

Medical herbs: from the ancient Egyptian wound treatment to the current intelligent bandages   
DOI:https://doi.org/10.71067/AePVII-2022-129-174 
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Aegyptus et Pannonia VII, Acta Symposii anno 2021, Plants and Health from Ancient Egypt. to the Present Day.
Proceedings of the Conference held between 14th and 16th October 2021, Budapest; ed. by Hedvig Győry.
Published by The Ancient Egyptian Committee of the Hungarian-Egyptian Friendship Society, Budapest 2022, ISBN: 978-615-6571-01-4; DOI: https://doi.org/10.71067/AePVII-2022  
Soft cover. No Jacket. 1.st Edition. 6+338 pages (24x17), with colour pictures.

Abstract:
Traditional herbs have been used in medicine for thousands of years. Descriptions have survived on several ancient Egyptian papyri, among them one surgical book. The Smith papyrus forms a basis for today’s wound care, with its precise formulations and methodology on its recto (front) side. The cases are all injuries, treated in a traditional way. Studying them, we differentiated two development stages. The earlier, simpler one contained no herbal ingredient, while the later one, with prescriptions Sm41 and Sm46, had several herbal drugs, distried in three or four phases. Medical herbs have been used in wound management for debridement, creation of an advantageous environment to encourage the natural healing process and speed up the recovery. Most of the herbal drugs are also employed nowadays for practical uses, thus many aspects of modern medicine can be described as a refined version of ancient Egyptian knowledge. We also looked for wound management in the Graeco-Roman period, comparing drug usage, and identified many changes. This paper also compares ancient Egyptian bandaging used for the care of wounds and their cleaning methods, with modern wound dressing in order to shed light on both shared and distinct concepts