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Our world has allowed the obsession with medication to get a little out of hand. While some people require medicines to function properly, far too often doctors simply prescribe something because they can think of no better way to handle any given problem. Some problems can’t be solved with just a pill or a poultice.

The over-emphasis on drugs can easily lead a person to question whether they are ever a good idea in the first place. When medicines are the main way problems get solved, it’s enough to make it seem like our entire medical ideology might be based on flawed assumptions. In cases such as the treatment of depression, for instance, the general method is simply to throw various treatments against the proverbial wall and see which ones stick. Could you imagine if any industry besides medicine attempted to fix problems in this manner?

Ultimately medicine is going to have to ease up on the use of medication and focus more on long-lasting treatments that do not simply involve ingesting a constant stream of pharmaceuticals. While this may reduce profits in the short term, the long-term benefit to our society will be great. After all, solving problems in the real world implies a lot more than just throwing pills down someone’s throat and hoping for the best. In the vast majority of cases, simply drugging up an individual in an attempt to treat them is a foolish way to go about trying to help them.

Schooling is one of the easiest ways to tell the difference between the two professions. While both may start out pursing the same bachelor degree, they part ways when it comes time to receive a master’s or doctorate degree. A psychologist works through a graduate degree and then has the opportunity to become a doctor of psychologist or philosophy. Even after receiving a doctorate, there is still training to be done in the form of internships.

For a psychiatrist, the training is more specific to the medical field. In fact, he or she, at the end of all schooling, has a degree in medicine. Once receiving a doctorate, the training continues in the form of a residency in the mental health field. Because of the background in medicine, a psychiatrist is able to prescribe medication to patients to assist them with symptoms and concerns that they may have.

For those having a difficult time deciding which career path to choose, undergraduate classes offer a great way to explore what each career path offers. Classes expose students to each side of the coin, helping them to make a more informed decision.

The decision seems questionable and downright icky when you first see these little medical monsters. Leeches are a type of water-based worm with a suction cup mouth and a battalion of tiny teeth. Their skin is slick and patterned with muted geometric stripes. This pattern camouflages the leech in muddy water, where it lays in wait to engorge itself on the blood of dogs, cattle, and of course, humans.

Employing this slimy parasite in a sterile medical procedure sounds like an idea from a horror movie. Yet when it comes to moving and directing blood, the parasite is nature’s expert. Its saliva contains antibiotics, anaesthetics, and anticoagulants to prevent blood clotting. The leech itself is a suction machine, made to siphon a large quantity of blood. Taken together, these qualities give the leech the power to remove clotted, stopped blood from a wound or an obstructed vein. Modern doctors find that hirudotherapy, or the use of medicinal leeches, is one of the best ways to prevent the onset or advance of gangrene.

But modern hirudotherapy is just starting to hit its stride. Doctors have found that the leech’s saliva is a valuable medicinal discovery on its own. Leech saliva can be harvested without hurting the leeches, and thus collected to treat internal medical problems as well. It is being examined as a possible preventative measure for clot-related diseases like heart attacks, thrombosis, and strokes.

Thanks to their saliva and other medicinal properties, leeches may finally be able to repay us humans for the blood they’ve been stealing over the ages.