Book Cover Reveal for my new book – Florence Nightingale’s Rivals: Nursing through the Crimea.

Absolutely love what my publisher Pen & Sword have come up with. This is the story about nursing relationships during what was a first for nursing, for social history and for women; taking part in an 'experiment' for military nursing, in the theatre of war. The hardships these women went through is beyond our imagination …

A Medicinal History of … Tisane

Ancient medicinal and food crop - Barley. Drawing by Fauget (1867), Histoire de Plantes The word Tisane is derived from the Ancient Greek ptisane which developed into the French tisane meaning medicinal tea and today known as a herbal tea. Under the Syrian Arab Republic, tisane is recognised as a pharmaceutical method of administering herbs …

A Medicinal History of … Poultice

Charcoal Poultice. Image courtesy of Paul Simpson [Flickr], detail available from How to Make an Activated Charcoal Poultice Poultices, also known as fomentations and cataplasms, have been used since ancient times. A preparation of various warm herbs, plants, foodstuffs in a cloth packet, usually a bandage of some description, would be laid directly over the …

A Short History of St John’s Wort 🌿

Image courtesy of http://www.publicdomainreview.org The The flowering plant in the image is Ypericon, known in the modern world as St John's Wort, a common herbal medicine to treat depression and anxiety. Hence its considered ability to repel demons, as illustrated here in the Tractatus de Herbis (c.1440) and thought to be a copy of an …