See striking photos of medical objects chosen to spark discussion in your classroom. All objects featured here are on display in Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries.
Find out what your elders mean when they say ‘spend a penny’ and hunt through the galleries to find a merman.
A practical guide to help you explore Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries.
Explore the brand new Medicine: The Wellcome Galleries as a team with fun games and challenges.
This plastic mask was worn by a patient having radiotherapy for throat cancer in 2018.
This prosthetic (artificial replacement) arm was made in 1904 for a professional pianist – a woman called Elizabeth Burton.
This jar was made and used between 1830 and 1870. It was used to store leeches – a kind of worm that survives by sucking blood from other animals.
This medicine chest, made in the 1780s, was owned by a doctor called Edward Jenner, who is famous as a pioneer of vaccination.
This machine, made in 1958, is an electroencephalograph (EEG) – a device that measures electrical activity in the brain.
This is a packet of Gold Flake brand cigarettes, made some time between 1920 and 1950 by W D & H O (William Day and Henry Overton) Wills – one of the first companies to mass-produce cigarettes.
This rubber cap was made around 1920. When inserted into a woman’s vagina, it prevented sperm from reaching the uterus, and so prevented pregnancy.
This device, used in operating theatres in the 1870s and 1880s, filled the air with a pungent, yellow mist of an antiseptic called carbolic acid.