Syringes are important medical tools and have existed for thousands of years. The humble hypodermic injection is also known in Scotland as the jaborjag. Its history is more complex and is characterised by experimentation and innovation.

What is a syringe?

Healthcare professionals use syringes to inject medicine into a patient's body. They also use syringes to extract blood and other fluids from the body. Syringes are also used in cooking, gardening and laboratory work. 

A syringe has three parts. First there is the needle. This sharp hollow tube pierces the skin and injects medication into the body. The needle is the part of the syringe that some people find scary!

The barrel holds the medicine before injection and is usually transparent. Once injected, the medicine is no longer visible in the barrel.

Finally, the plunger and piston work together to help control the amount of medicine injected into the body.

Early syringes

Early syringes didn’t have needles. The plunger was pulled back to suction fluid from the body, or pushed out to apply medicine or ointment. One of the first medical uses was the removal of cataracts from the eye through suction. 

Early needles took the form of hollow reeds, glass tubes and goose quills.

Who invented modern syringes?

Scottish doctor Alexander Wood is credited with inventing the modern hypodermic syringe in 1853. His goal was to treat pain in one area of the body. He attached a hollow needle, an earlier invention by Irish doctor Francis Rynd, to a plunger. 

Wood's first patient was a woman experiencing neuralgia, which causes intense pain after nerve damage. He used the hypodermic syringe to inject the powerful pain relief medicine Morphia, a mixture of sherry and morphine, to the site of her pain.

French orthopaedic surgeon, Charles Gabriel Pravaz, invented a syringe around the same time. Despite inventing them in the same year, Wood is credited with the invention of the syringe. 

Pravaz used silver, as opposed to glass, to make his syringe. The contents were not visible and it was difficult to control the amount of medicine given to a patient. Pravaz’s plunger mechanism was also different. It used a screw, rather than pushing down a plunger. This enabled the injection of small, measured amounts into an area, without creating a cut in the skin. 

The glass sides of Wood’s syringe made it easy to see the dosage, and the plunger allowed more control.

Adding measurements to the side of syringes gave more control over dosage. Before this, medicine doses were often measured roughly and too much or too little given to a patient. The design of syringes hasn’t changed since.

Syringe material

Depending on their use, syringes are made of different types of material. Historically, syringes were made of metal and glass. This meant they were easy to clean and reuse. Before an understanding of antiseptics this was a recipe to spread disease. After discovering the importance of sterilisation, needles and syringes were sterilised between uses. Today most syringes are plastic with stainless steel needles and are single use. This ensures they are sterile for each use and won’t spread disease.

Reusing syringes

While plastic syringes are intended for single use, in some cases where materials are in short supply plastic syringes are re-used. This can cause the spread of disease, particularly Hepatitis and HIV. The K1 auto-disable syringe was invented in the late 1990's for single use. After pressing down the plunger it cannot be pulled back up. This design combats the spread of disease through needle reuse. Some people also use Needle Exchange Services to access sterile injecting equipment and to dispose of used needles safely.

Modern syringes

The syringe used to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine closely resembles historic ones in our collections. Medical professionals use modern syringes for a variety of purposes for both humans and animals:

• Injecting drugs into the body
• Intravenous therapy into the bloodstream
• Applying glue or lubricants
• Measuring and drawing liquids

Types of modern syringe

Insulin syringes

Insulin Syringes are one of the more common types of syringes. They are single-use, inexpensive and often incorporate a fine needle.

Tuberculin syringes

Tuberculin syringes are small in size and hold up to 1ml of fluid. Healthcare professionals use them to perform tuberculosis tests called PPD.

Multi-shot needle syringes

Multi-shot needle syringes can provide several doses from the same syringe. The contents refill from a built-in reservoir after each injection. These types of needles are rarely used due to a risk of contamination.

Venom extraction syringes

Venom extraction syringes are designed to extract venom from wounds without puncturing. These syringes create a vacuum that sucks out the poison from the wound.

Oral syringes

Oral syringes are used for the accurate measurement of medicine doses. They are often used with small children or animals to deliver drugs directly into the mouth.

Dental syringes

Dentists use dental syringes to administer the anaesthetic solution. They also use them to supply water, compressed air or mist to the oral cavity. This cleans debris away from the area the dentist is working on.

You can learn more about syringes and the development of the COVID-19 vaccine in the upcoming exhibition Injecting Hope: The race for a COVID-19 vaccine