If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Karza »

Havok wrote:I've never even had a cavity in my adult teeth. :D
Cavities aren't the reason my teeth would be a mess either. The problem is some of my adult teeth chose to pop out of my gums from interesting places. I don't know how well 19th century medicine could unfuck that sort of thing.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by General Zod »

Karza wrote:
Havok wrote:I've never even had a cavity in my adult teeth. :D
Cavities aren't the reason my teeth would be a mess either. The problem is some of my adult teeth chose to pop out of my gums from interesting places. I don't know how well 19th century medicine could unfuck that sort of thing.
You might be able to get gold teeth put in after they were yanked, but 19th century dentistry was. . .considerably less pleasant than it is now.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Count Chocula »

Assuming tonsilitis is not fatal, I'd be alive but probably with hearing loss from childhood ear infections (instead of from airplanes and guns!). And I'd have snaggle-teeth.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Prannon »

I might or might not have died in childhood. Apparently I took a really nasty hit to the head when I was little that required some stitches to fix. Only 3 stitches, and I have no idea what I did to myself, but still.

Other than that, no broken bones or particularly nasty infections to speak of, aside from a few bouts with seasonal colds and flus, and a very nasty stomach virus episode. Come to think of it, the flu I had last year had me in a really bad way. I had to get some medications to conquer that one, and even then I blacked out and collapsed at one point.

So, I guess most likely alive since I'm still young and strong. Possibly dead if the illnesses I've had were worse than I think they were.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by The Grim Squeaker »

Dead. I cracked my head open 4 times, the first would have killed me without stitches.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Darth Fanboy »

If I was born 200 years ago i'd probably be dead by now.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Duckie »

The Grim Squeaker wrote:Dead. I cracked my head open 4 times, the first would have killed me without stitches.
In this thread that guy who changes his name every week doesn't realise how old catgut and a sewing needle are.

Seriously, 1800 isn't 8000 BC guys, stitches exist.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by The Yosemite Bear »

Duckie wrote:
The Grim Squeaker wrote:Dead. I cracked my head open 4 times, the first would have killed me without stitches.
In this thread that guy who changes his name every week doesn't realise how old catgut and a sewing needle are.

Seriously, 1800 isn't 8000 BC guys, stitches exist.

Of course back then we would have gotten you drunk in order to numb the pain.

reminds me of other uses for maggots that my step-mom told me about in her ER roatation....
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Shogoki »

Having never suffered anything worse than colds, 2 broken fingers and the odd stomach aches, i guess i would be alive, but my mother and second brother die when I'm 5 (emergency slightly premature c-section, but they are both perfectly healthy otherwise, a shame). My dad dies as i turn 23 due to diabetes.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Adept »

Quite likely dead during infancy or very early childhood (if I was lucky) as a result of complications from cystic fibrosis.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Koolaidkirby »

I'd be perfectly healthy, (assuming i didn't catch something I've been vacinated for, like polio) havn't even had a cold in like 6+ years, I have a very strong immune system
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by The Grim Squeaker »

Duckie wrote:
The Grim Squeaker wrote:Dead. I cracked my head open 4 times, the first would have killed me without stitches.
In this thread that guy who changes his name every week doesn't realise how old catgut and a sewing needle are.

Seriously, 1800 isn't 8000 BC guys, stitches exist.
What's the statistical success rate for sewing a baby's skull back together?
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Thanas »

Gandalf wrote:I'd be fine enough, though my epilepsy would certainly cause problems.
Yeah, you might have been lobotomized. Fun times.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by salm »

Thanas wrote:
Gandalf wrote:I'd be fine enough, though my epilepsy would certainly cause problems.
Yeah, you might have been lobotomized. Fun times.
I think lobotomies were only introduced about 100 years ago.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Bounty »

Duckie wrote:
The Grim Squeaker wrote:Dead. I cracked my head open 4 times, the first would have killed me without stitches.
In this thread that guy who changes his name every week doesn't realise how old catgut and a sewing needle are.

Seriously, 1800 isn't 8000 BC guys, stitches exist.
This thread is an excellent primer on how modern kids see history: there's "now", there's "a while ago" when we won against the nazis, and "a long time ago" when knights and people in funny wigs roamed the land and a bruise could kill you.

In 1809 people fell, people got sick, people broke bones and had chipped teeth and were born the wrong way around. People needed to deal with these problems just as we do. They didn't have medical technology half as good as ours, but they did have it. It was crude and not always effective, but they did have an idea on how to fix common problems.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Broomstick »

The Grim Squeaker wrote:
Duckie wrote:
The Grim Squeaker wrote:Dead. I cracked my head open 4 times, the first would have killed me without stitches.
In this thread that guy who changes his name every week doesn't realise how old catgut and a sewing needle are.

Seriously, 1800 isn't 8000 BC guys, stitches exist.
What's the statistical success rate for sewing a baby's skull back together?
For just stitches? Pretty damn high. You said you needed stitches, not skull reconstruction.

Seriously, some of you folks seem to think it was the stone age, or that people dropped dead from things are survivable. My mother survived jaundice when she was about 8 and despite a high fever and turning yellow they never took her to a hospital, she survived on her own, at home, in bed, being cared for by her family. Dad almost died of a burst appendix in his teens and only a new experimental drug saved him at the time (we now call that drug "penicillin") but people used to survive bouts of acute appendicitis - not always, but some did survive. People survived tonsillitis all the time, along with broken bones, ear infections, getting stitches, high fevers and the like. How they survived was a bit different - for really high fevers they'd put you in a cold bath (someone already mentioned that upthread - I don't know why they think that wouldn't also be done in 1809) instead of giving you a pill, and infections you'd have to battle on your own so instead of taking a week it might take a month or two to fight off a really bad one. Premature babies born a month early did survive, and babies also survived C-sections (though frequently the mothers didn't - actually, it was usually used only when the mother was already dead or clearly dying anyway) Ear infections were more likely to cause hearing damage, but there were a sizable number of hard-of-hearing people and even deaf people running around (Martha's Vineyard had so many they had a community where everyone hearing was bilingual with sign language as well as early at the 1700's). Granted, medicine was limited but it wasn't non-existent!
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Big Orange »

I'd perhaps have more chance of being a dead duck at birth, since I was coming out the wrong way, while I would much more likely be either killed or more gravely maimed for life by the two to three serious injuries I've sustained. Even as comparatively recently as 1909, at least 1 in 4 infants died in child birth.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Edi »

I'd probably be dead of a combination of pneumonia and severe influenza that I suffered at age 12. Not a certain thing, but high chance. If I survived that, I'd probably have damage in one or both ears from the numerous ear infections I suffered as a child.

Of the rest of my family, only my mother would be alive.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Stofsk »

My medical history has been spotless. No allergies, no broken limbs, no major surgery, no life-threatening ailments or diseases...

I guess that makes me one of the hardy members of the board. :)
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Broomstick »

For now....
A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. Leonard Nimoy.

Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.

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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Stofsk »

Broomstick wrote:For now....
:P
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Solauren »

Let's see.

Without considering disease; Farsighted.

Multple cases of Chicken Pox. (red) Measels, possibly German Measels, phenomia, double phenomia, and the odd flu case that while didn't require medication, did have me projectile vomiting (cue the exercism).

Combine that with a trick shoulder (I can dislocate it at will without feeling pain) (cue the exercism), and abnormal strength as a teenager...

Odds are, I'd either be dead from disease, burned as a witch, or drafted into an army and dead in battle.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by UCBooties »

I'd have died at birth. I was ten weeks premature, completely non-viable without a respirator. In fact, may parents were informed that they would not have been able to save me if I had been born five years earlier, let alone 200.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Bounty »

Combine that with a trick shoulder (I can dislocate it at will without feeling pain) (cue the exercism), and abnormal strength as a teenager...

Odds are, I'd either be dead from disease, burned as a witch, or drafted into an army and dead in battle.
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Re: If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

Post by Vehrec »

Minor chance of death due to multiple high fevers in my childhood, and at least two cases of bronchitis. Come to think of it, I've had a lot of things treated with antibiotics over the years, so let's kick that up to a probable death for me. Nothing that's totally lethal without treatment, but still pretty bad odds.
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