Medicine

The Order of Maesters is an order of scholars, healers, and learned men. While not all maesters have, as a rule, received training in medicine (signified by a silver link in their chains), many have received medical training and serve as doctors throughout the Seven Kingdoms. Maesters appointed to major castles such as Winterfell or the Red Keep in King's Landing usually have been trained in medicine.

Known medical substances include:


 * Essence of Nightshade
 * Milk of the poppy
 * Shade of the Evening

Several lethal poisons are used by the world’s assassins. Though even strong medicines such as Essence of Nightshade are technically lethal if someone intentionally takes an overdose, poisons used in assassinations are more often subtle, and difficult to trace. Among these poisons are:


 * Tears of Lys
 * Manticore venom
 * Wolfsbane
 * The strangler
 * The Long Farewell

Known diseases in the world include:


 * The Great Spring Sickness - a devastating plague that tore through Westeros 90 years before the War of the Five Kings, which significantly reduced the population.
 * Greyscale - a dreaded and usually fatal disease that can leave flesh stiff and dead, and the skin cracked and flaking, mottled black and grey, and stone-like to the touch.

Known physiological conditions which are not "diseases" include:


 * Dwarfism - a congenital condition in which a person is born with significantly below-average height.
 * Eunuchs - males who have had some or all of their genitals removed, often purposefully by slave-masters or as punishment for a crime, etc.
 * "Lackwit" - common term for the mentally disabled, covering a wide range of mental handicaps.
 * "Targaryen madness" - the noted tendency towards insanity that ran through the bloodline of House Targaryen, which resulted from many generations of compound inbreeding, incestuously marrying brother to sister to "keep the bloodline pure".