Erectile dysfunction, allergies or even kidney stones and caesarean section… In The crazy history of medicine, Laurent Turcot is interested in a playful, accessible and didactic way in medical conditions and treatments, very common in Quebec, in three stages: the past, the present and the future. “We wanted people to be able to understand them better while having fun,” the star historian immediately announced during a press conference held virtually by Radio-Canada.
Because the COVID-19 pandemic has been mobilizing all the news concerning health for almost three years now, the latter has decided to highlight all these evils and, sometimes, these misfortunes which affect many people and, this fact, to show them the different ways in which they can get help as well as what they can hope for in the future.
“You wonder what a historian like me does in medicine, don’t you? quickly launches, in a joking tone, the excellent popularizer behind his screen. We thus learn through the 13 programs of the series The crazy story medicine that several members of his family — who also participate in the documentary series — are practitioners or specialists in biology and that Laurent Turcot has always been immersed in the world of health. “The fact remains that, related or not, each speaker has the mission of enlightening us on therapeutic developments,” he says.
And the director of The crazy history of medicine, Marie Carpentier, to specify: “Laurent Turcot, with his very “historian” and curious side, begins a personal quest in which he leads viewers to discover and deepen things with him. For her, the facilitator’s spontaneity and eloquence are a real strength in generalizing and making known to all audiences often complex medical terms and techniques. “He’s not afraid of ridicule and always asks a lot of questions,” she says. The result is that in a short time, around thirty minutes per episode, “we learn a lot of things”.
Let’s get to the facts
Speaking of which, what strikes you first when you look The crazy history of medicine, is that some very old theories are still up to date. “When we ask researchers who are currently working on new techniques for treating cardiac arrest, for example, we come back to what the fathers of medicine like Hippocrates and Claude Galen, who lived during antiquity, been able to say”, emphasizes Laurent Turcot. But at the time, the technique, of course, was not advanced enough to carry out their ideas.
Mental health is no exception. “When we went to the brain bank at the Douglas Institute in Montreal to talk about depression, we were told that there was probably an enzyme that was responsible for this disorder. It’s funny because at the start of the episode, we indicate that Hippocrates was thinking exactly the same thing,” enthused Laurent Turcot.
This episode is also the one that most affected the host of the documentary series. “We had to be very careful and exercise caution because, as we often tell the public, the number of diagnoses has exploded since the pandemic,” he says. But there again, The crazy history of medicine shows that what certain authors of the Renaissance advocated still prevails. “Several centuries ago, singing and music were already prescribed as a remedy for depression,” notes Laurent Turcot cheerfully.
When we went to the Douglas Institute brain bank to talk about depression, we were told that there was probably an enzyme that was responsible for this disorder. It’s funny because at the beginning of the episode we indicate that Hippocrates was thinking the exact same thing.
Conversely, and we can easily consider that this is a chance, certain medical exercises have been abandoned. “A long time ago, when we were depressed, we said that our mood was black and that we had to bleed the body to renew it,” he explains. Not very reassuring when you know that it was recommended at the time to get rid of about ten liters of blood and that you now know that the human body only contains about five. Ditto for trepanation, a surgical procedure which consists of making a hole in the cranial box, which was once recommended to treat depression…
At present
The crazy history of medicine also highlights the extent to which medical research is fundamental in Quebec. ” It’s impressive ! Scientists are passionate and they really want to tell their stories,” says Laurent Turcot. According to him, we must continue to go ahead of medical knowledge in order to draw the attention of viewers to the fact that certain medical specialties are sorely lacking in resources.
Moreover, The crazy history of medicine confronts several points of view. “There are two schools that are currently competing in the Quebec field of allergies, remarks Laurent Turcot. On the one hand, we don’t want to desensitize allergic people, at the risk of killing the patients, but, on the other hand, we say that, thanks to desensitization, we help them to live. Despite a very clear scientific literature, the debates never stop. “Neither does research,” adds the host, who is happy to have had the privilege of working with many doctors at a time when access to care is increasingly difficult in the province.
The director, Marie Carpentier, finally confides that the humor of the historian makes the documentary series unique, in the sense that it offers the possibility of challenging several generations of viewers. “The visual animations created by Marc Pelletier, the testimonies of doctors and the experiments carried out by Laurent Turcot in front of the camera speak as much to children as to their parents and grandparents, and, more broadly, to all those who might wonder on a disease that affects those around them,” she concludes.