Özet:

The methods used by the midwife or traditional woman healer are the treatment methods formed through the practices of folk medicine based on the experience transferred from generation to generation. Reaching the resource persons practicing these methods, it is important in terms of the history of medicine to collect the unique healing practices and register this information.Being aware of the traditional practices carried out will help the health professionals, servicing for the health care of community, and determine the health needs of it. In this context, our study aims to evaluate the practices of a woman healer living today. Traditional woman healer was visited to home by researchers in the village of Uzuncaburç Silifke, Mersin Province on 20 of February 2016. After the healer’s approval the researchers informed her about the purpose of the study and using the in-depth interview technique, they had face-to-face talk with her. The woman healer is mainly interested in the practices of the treatment of gynecological diseases and other systemic diseases. The resource person in this research is 86 years old, literate and has continued her practices actively for 50 years. The healers told that she gave birth to 82 women both in the village of Uzuncaburç and in nearby villages. The midwife is applying religious, vegetable and animal origin treatments in giving birth and for other systemic diseases The midwife’s practices were compared with the practices mentioned in ancient medicine books, and the practices done in other regions of Anatolia.Although it is important to register this kind of information since the unique practices of the traditional woman healer and midwife will contribute to the folk medicine, medical history, traditional treatment and care practices, it is possible to say that some of the applications may cause medical drawbacks and delay the implementation of modern medicine

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