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The most common complication from leech treatment is prolonged bleeding, which can easily be treated, but more serious allergic reactions and bacterial infections may also occur. [5] Leech therapy was classified by the US Food and Drug Administration as a medical device in 2004. [22]
Through the early decades of the century, hundreds of millions of leeches were used by physicians throughout Europe. [32] One typical course of medical treatment began the morning of 13 July 1824. A French sergeant was stabbed through the chest while engaged in single combat; within minutes, he fainted from loss of blood.
Leeches have been used in medicine from ancient times until the 19th century to draw blood from patients. In modern times, leeches find medical use in treatment of joint diseases such as epicondylitis and osteoarthritis, extremity vein diseases, and in microsurgery, while hirudin is used as an anticoagulant drug to treat blood-clotting disorders.
A jar for keeping medicinal leeches Hirudo medicinalis, a medicinal leech, attached to the skin. A leech collector, leech gatherer, or leech finder was a person occupied with procuring medicinal leeches, which were in growing demand in 19th-century Europe. Leeches were used in bloodletting but were not easy for medical practitioners to obtain ...
Franz Anton Maulbertsch's The Quack (c. 1785) shows barber surgeons at work. Bloodletting set of a barber surgeon, beginning of 19th century, Märkisches Museum Berlin. The barber surgeon was one of the most common European medical practitioners of the Middle Ages, generally charged with caring for soldiers during and after battle.
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Hirudin is a naturally occurring peptide in the salivary glands of blood-sucking leeches (such as Hirudo medicinalis) that has a blood anticoagulant property. [2] This is essential for the leeches' habit of feeding on blood, since it keeps a host's blood flowing after the worm's initial puncture of the skin.
The Hirudiniformes are one of the currently-accepted suborders of the proboscisless leeches (Arhynchobdellida).Their best-known member is the European medical leech, Hirudo medicinalis, and indeed most of the blood-sucking "worms" as which leeches are generally perceived belong to this group.