Medicine of Gor

Physicians

"Similarly men of such castes as the Physicians and Builders make use of the fairs to disseminate and exchange information pertaining to their respective crafts."
"Outlaw of Gor" page 47

"On the other hand, I suspect that they fear too broad a dissemination of the Caste knowledge. Physicians, interestingly, perhaps for a similar reason, tend to keep records in archaic Gorean, which is incomprehensible to most Goreans."
"Magicians of Gor" page 395

"A notable exception to the generalization that woman of a caste normally do not engage in caste work is the caste of Physicians, whose women are commonly trained, as are the boys, in the practice of medicine. Even the Physicians, however, normally do not admit their women to full practice until they have borne two childeren. The purpose of this is to retain a high level of intelligence in the caste. Professional women, it is well understood, tend not to reproduce themselves, a situation which, over time, would be likely to produce a diminution of the quality of the caste. Concern for the future of the caste is thus evinced in this limitation by the physicians on the rights of their women to participate without delay in the caste craft. The welfare of the caste, typically, takes priority in the Gorean mind over the ambitiouns of specific individuals." >br>"Fighting Slave of Gor" page 210

"The women of the Physicians, at the age of fifteen, in many cities, wear two bracelets on her left wrist. When she has one child one bracelet is removed; when she has a second child the second bracelet is removed. She may then, if she desires, enter into the full practice of her craft."
"Fighting Slave of Gor" page 210

"I was pleased that she would go to Ar, where she, though a woman, might learn the craft of medicine under the masters appointed by Kazrak,"
"Priest-Kings of Gor" page 306

"Similarly men of such castes as the Physicians and Builders make use of the fairs to disseminate and exchange information pertaining to their respective crafts."
"Outlaw of Gor" page 47

Physician's Practice

"The Building where I would wait on these days was the house of a physician. I was taken through a corridor to a special, rough room, where slaves were treated. There my camisk would be removed. On the first day the physician, a quiet man in the green garments of his caste, examined me, thoroughly. The instruments he used, the tests he performed, the samples he required were not unlike those of Earth.(...) Further, certain pieces of his instrumentation were clearly far from primitive. For example, there was a small machine with gauges and dials. In this he would place slides, containing drops of blood and urine, flecks of tissue, a strand of hair. With a stylus he would note readings on the machine, and, on a small screen at the top of the machine, I saw, vastly enlarged, what reminded me of an image witnessed under a microscope. He would briefly study this image, and then make further jottings with his stylus (...). When he was finished he mixed several powders in three or four goblets, adding water to them and stirring them. These I was ordered to drink".
"Captive of Gor" page 92/3

"I was then at the infirmary. I had not known if it would be practical place to hide or not. I found that it was not. There the girls lay on wooden pallets, on the ground, chained to them by the wrist, ankles and neck."
"Vagabonds of gor" page 456

Fees

""Thurnock," said I, "give this Physician a double tarn, of gold.""
"Marauders of Gor" page 19

"A physician entered the booth, with his kit slung over the shoulder of his green robes. He began to attend to the merchant.(...) When the Physician had finished the cleansing, chemical sterilization and dressing of the merchants wounds, he left. With him the majority of the watchers withdrew as well. The Scribe had paid the Physician from a small iron box, taken from a locked trunk, a tarsk bit."
"Beasts of Gor" page 104

Disease's of Gor

Dar - Kosis

"He was now bent and crooked, like a broken blasted shrub in his yellow shroudlike robe. The hood concealed his face. (...)
Pointing to its shadowed concealed face it whispered "The Holy Disease." That was the literal translation of Dar Kosis--the Holy Disease or equivalent the Sacred Affliction. The disease is named that because it is regarded as being holy to the Priest Kings, and those who suffer from it are regarded as consecrated to the Preist Kings. Accordingly it is regarded as heresy to shed their blood. On the other hand, the Afflicted, as they are called, have little to fear from their fellow men. Their disease is so highly contagious, so invariably devastating in its effects, and so feared on the planet that even the boldest of outlaws gives them a wide berth. Accordingly, the afflicted enjoy a large amount of freedom of movement on Gor. They are of course, warned to stay away from the habitations of men, and if they approach too closely, they are sometimes stoned. Oddly enough, casuisically, stoning the Afflicted is not regarded as a violation of the Priest Kings supposed injunction against shedding their blood. As an act of charity, Initiates have arranged at various places Dar Kosis pits where the Afflicted may volutarily imprison themselves to be fed with food hurled downward from the backs of passing tarns. Once in a Dar Kosis pit the Afflicted are not allowed to depart. (...)
I was glad that it was night and that the hood of the man was drawn, for I had no desire to look on what peices of flesh might still cling to his skull."
"Tarnsman of Gor" page 150/1

"No," said Flaminius, smiling. "No." He took another swallow. "I thought to find," said he, "an immunization against Dar-kosis."
"Dar-kosis is incurable," I said.
"At one time," said he, "centuries ago, men of my caste claimed age was incurable. Others did not accept this and continued to work. The result was the Stabilization Serums."
Dar-Kosis, or the Holy Disease, or Sacred Affliction, is a virulent, wasting disease of Gor. Those afflicted with it, commonly spoken of simply as the Afflicted Ones, may not enter into normal society. They wander the countyside in shroudlike yellow rags, beating a wooden clapping device to warn men from their path; some of them volunteer to be placed in Dar-kosis pits, several of which lay within the vicinity of Ar, where they are fed and given drink, and are, of course, isolated; The disease is extremely contagious. Those who contact the disease are regarded by law as dead."
"Assassin of Gor" page 265/6

"For many years," said Flaminius, "and this was even before 10,110, the year of Pa-Kur and his horde, I and others worked secretly in the Cylinder of Physicians. We devoted our time, those Ahn in the day in which we could work, to study, research, test and experiment. Unfortunately, for spite and for gold, word of our work was brought to the High Initiate, by a minor Physician discharged from our staff for incompetence. The Cylinder of Initiates demanded that the High Council of the Caste of Physicians put an end to our work, not only that it be discontinued but that our results to that date be destroyed. The Physicians, I am pleased to say, stood with us. There is little love lost between Physicians and Initiates, even as is the case between Scribes and Initiates. The Cylinder of the High Initiate then petitioned the High Council of the City to stop our work, but they, on the recommendation of Marlenus, who was then Ubar, permitted out work to continue." Flaminius laughed. "I remember Marlenus speaking to the High Initiate. Marlenus told him that either the Priest-Kings approved of our work or they did not; that if they approved, it should continue; if they did not approve, they themselves, as the Masters of Gor, would be quite powerful enough to put an end to it."(...)
Flaminius took another drink, and then he looked at me, bitterly.
"Before the next passage hand," said he, "armed men broke into the Cylinder of Physicians; the floors we worked on were burned; the Cylinder itself was seriously damaged; our work, our records, the animals we used were all destroyed; several of my staff were slain, others driven away." He drew his tunic over his head. I saw that half of his body was scarred. "These I had from the flames," said he, "as I tried to rescue our work. But I was beaten away and our scrolls destroyed." He slipped the tunic back over his head.
"I had," he said, "shortly before the fire developed a strain of urts resistant to the Dar-kosis organism; a serum cultured from their blood was injected in other animals, which subsequently we were unable to infect. It was tentative, only a beginning, but I had hoped---I had hoped very much."
"Assassin of Gor" page 267

Bazi Plague

"It is the Plague! she cried. It is the Plague! I walked over to a mirror. I ran my tounge over my lips they seemed dry. The whites of my eyes clearly were yellow. I rolled up the sleeve of my tunic and saw there on the flesh of the forearm like black blisters open, erupted, a scattering of pustules."
"Explorers of Gor" pg 135

"I simply did not feel ill. I was slightly drunk and heated from the paga, but I did not believe myself fevered. My pulse and heartbeat, and respiration, seemed normal. I did not have difficulty catching my breath. I was niether dizzy nor nauseous, and my vision was clear. My worst physical symptoms were the irritation about my eyes and the genuinely nasty itchiness of my skin. I felt like tearing it off with my own fingernails."
"Explorers of Gor" page 136

"I knew that I had not been in a plague area. Too, the Bazi Plague had burned itself out years ago. No cases to my knowledge had been reported for months."
"Explorers of Gor" page 136

"The Physician would check the health of the crew and slaves, Plague some years ago had broken out in Bazi, to the North, which port had been closed by the merchants for two years. In some eighteen months it had burned itself out, moving south and eastward. Bazi had not yet recovered from the economic blow."
"Explorers of Gor" page 117

"The tall man crouched down beside us, irritably. One of the men with him wore the green of the physicians. The tall man looked at us. As naked female slaves we averted our eyes from his. I smelled the straw.
“Wrist-ring key,” said the tall man.
The merchant handed him the key that would unlock the wrist rings.
“Leave the lamp and withdraw,” said the tall man. The short merchant handed him the lamp and, frightened, left the room.
The men crouched down and crowded about the auburn-haired girl. I heard them unlock one of her wrist rings.
“We are going to test you for pox,” he said. The girl groaned. It was my hope that none on board the Clouds of Telnus had carried the pox. It is transmitted by the bites of lice. The pox had appeared in Bazi some four years ago. The port had been closed for two years by the merchants. It had burned itself out moving south and eastward in some eighteen months. Oddly enough some were immune to the pox, and with others it had only a temporary, debilitating effect. With others it was swift, lethal and horrifying. Those who had survived the pox would presumably live to procreate themselves, on the whole presumably transmitting their immunity or relative immunity to their offspring. Slaves who contracted the pox were often summarily slain. It was thought that the slaughter of slaves had had its role to play in the containment of the pox in the vicinity of Bazi.
“It is not she,” said the physician. He sounded disappointed. This startled me. “Am I free of pox, Master?” asked the auburn-haired girl.
“Yes,” said the physician, irritably. His irritation made no sense to me.
The tall man then closed the auburn-haired girl’s wrist again in its wrist ring. The men crouched down about me. I shrank back against the wall. My left wrist was removed from its wrist ring and the tall man pulled my arm out from my body, turning the wrist, so as to expose the inside of my arm.
I understood then they were not concerned with the pox, which had vanished in the vicinity of Bazi over two years ago.
The physician swabbed a transparent fluid on my arm. Suddenly, startling me, elating the men, there emerged, as though by magic, a tiny, printed sentence, in fine characters, in bright red. It was on the inside of my elbow. I knew what the sentence said, for my mistress, the Lady Elicia of Ar, had told me. It was a simple sentence. It said; “This is she.” It had been painted on my arm with a tiny brush, with another transparent fluid. I had seen the wetness on the inside of my arm, on the area where the arm bends, on the inside of the elbow, and then it had dried, disappearing. I was not even sure the writing had remained. But now, under the action of the reagent, the writing had emerged, fine and clear. Then, only a moment or so later, the physician, from another flask, poured some liquid on a rep-cloth swab, and, again as though by magic, erased the writing. The invisible stain was then gone. The original reagent was then again tried, to check the erasure. There was no reaction. The chemical brand, marking me for the agents with whom the Lady Elicia, my mistress, was associated, was gone. The physician then, with the second fluid, again cleaned my arm, removing the residue of the second application of the reagent. The men looked at one another, and smiled. My left wrist was again locked in its wrist ring.
“Am I free of the pox, Masters?” I asked.
“Yes,” said the physician."
"Slave Girl of Gor" page 325/6

"She, as a slave knows that if she should contract the disease she would in all probability be summarily slain."
"Explorers of Gor" page 134