d is then analyzed
for the presence of biochemical components of such diseases as diabetes,
anemia, arteriosclerosis, etc. A tiny sterile instrument called a blood
lancet may be used by the technician who draws the blood, who is still
called by the historical name, phlebotomist.

Cupping

"Cupping is an art," wrote the London cupper Samuel Bayfield in 1823, "the
value of which every one can appreciate who has had opportunities of being
made acquainted with its curative power by observing its effects on the
person of others, or by realizing them in his own."[87] The curious
operation of taking blood by means of exhausted cups had been part of
Western medicine since the time of Hippocrates, and has been found in many
other cultures as well. It is still practiced in some parts of the world
today.

Since antiquity medical authors have distinguished two forms of cupping,
dry and wet. In dry cupping, no blood was actually removed from the body.
A cup was exhausted of air and applied to the skin, causing the skin to
tumefy. In wet cupping, dry cupping was followed by the forming of several
incisions in the skin and a reapplication of the cups in order to collect
blood. It was possible to scarify parts of the body without
cupping--through the nineteenth-century physicians recommended scarifying
the lips, the nasal passages, the eyes, and the uterus. In order to remove
any sizeable amount of blood, however, it was necessary to apply some sort
of suction to the scarifications, because capillaries, unlike arteries and
veins, do not bleed freely. (Figure 8.)

Cupping was generally regarded as an auxiliary to venesection. The
indications for the operation were about the same as the indications for
phlebotomy, except that there was a tendency to prefer cupping in cases of
localized pain or inflammation, or if the patient was too young, too old,
or too weak to withstand phlebotomy. "If cutting a vein is an instant
danger, or if the mischief is still localised, recourse is to be had
rather to cupping," wrote the encyclopedist Celsus in the first century
A.D.[88]

As noted above, the ancients usually recommended cupping close to the seat
of the disease. However, there were several examples in ancient writings
of cupping a distant part in order to divert blood. The most famous of
these examples was Hippocrates' recommendation of cupping the breasts in
order to relieve excessive menstruation.[89]

As was the case for phlebo