Barber surgeon

The barber surgeon, one of the most common European medical practitioners of the Middle Ages, was generally charged with caring for soldiers during and after battle. In this era, surgery was seldom conducted by physicians, but instead by barbers, who, in having razors indispensable to their trade, were called upon for numerous tasks ranging from cutting hair to amputating limbs.

In this period, surgical mortality was very high, due to blood loss and infection. Yet since doctors thought that blood letting treated illness, barbers also applied leeches.

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