Charting the development
of Fair Tests of Treatments
The James Lind Library contains primary and secondary sources about our understanding of research methods in evaluating the effects of treatments.
New JLL Podcast
JLL Editors Richard Lehman and Raj Mehta discuss researcher and sponsor biases, and fraud in clinical research. “It’s been the default position for millennia”
James Lind was
an evidence-based pioneer
Find out how Lind conducted his controlled trial, in an effort to understand the best way to treat scurvy.
Feature: The Atlas of Materia Medica (11th Century)
A medieval Chinese text, the Ben Cao Tu Jing (“Atlas of Material Medica”) provides a comparative evaluation of the effect of ginseng on the speed a man could run.
Feature: John Haygarth (1800)
At the end of the 18th century, John Haygarth, an English physician, did placebo controlled trials to test the therapeutic claims made by Elisha Perkins for his ‘metallic tractors’.