A project to revive the diminishing number of medicinal leeches was launched by the London Zoo and it has been successful.

They seem to have been a bit of a luxury treatment, too expensive for the poor. The use of leeches to treat all sorts of ailments goes back to at least 1500BC, appearing in Egyptian tomb decorations.

They seem to have been a bit of a luxury treatment, too expensive for the poor. The use of leeches to treat all sorts of ailments goes back to at least 1500BC, appearing in Egyptian tomb decorations.

A rare breed of blood-sucking leech is being bred at London Zoo in a bid to save the UK’s largest native leech species from ...

The discrediting of general "bleeding" as a treatment for everything from hysteria to syphilis in the 19th century largely put an end to this history. However, in 1884 leech saliva was identified ...

Leeches secrete a substance through their saliva and mucus that actually thins blood, similar to the effect of blood-thinning medications, Haskins explained. 12 patients were given treatment ...

Medicinal leech saliva contains blood-thinning properties and was vital in the first positive results of human dialysis treatments.

The conditions for the trial arms were not even close to being comparable: Only patients in the leech therapy group received treatment that included intensive, individual direct physician contact ...