ANNALS OF MEDICINE about medicinal uses of the leech… Writer tells about a man in Wales whose cauliflower ear was treated by leeching it. The leech used in the procedure came from a company named Biopharm in south Wales, the world’s largest leech farm… Last summer the F.D.A. approved the leech for use as a medical device (maggots are also approved). There are more than six hundred and fifty species of leech and much that is known about them is the result of research by Roy T. Sawyer, an American-born zoologist who is Biopharm’s founder. Tells about Sawyer’s lifelong interest in leeches and his ambition to write the authoritative book on them. Leeches are found in virtually every kind of habitat. Only one species, however, is considered suitable for medicinal purposes: Hirudo Medicinalis, a freshwater leech once abundant in the lakes of Europe. Tells about the evolving use of leeches in medicine from ancient times to the nineteenth century when leeching peaked and the European freshwater leech became endangered… In addition to their use as blood-suckers, leech saliva serves as a powerful anti-coagulant. In1983. Sawyer created a startup company with the goal of identifying all of the curative chemicals in the leech… Describes the use of leeches by Boston surgeon Joseph Upton in a 1985 operation to sew an ear back on a boy. During the past decade, leeching has become part of the routine training for reconstructive plastic surgeons. Describes the reproduction, feeding and harvesting of leeches in tanks at Biopharm. Tells about a 1990 expedition by Sawyer and others to search for the giant Amazon leech in French Guiana. The team bagged thirty-five leeches and started a farm from which they isolated an enzyme called hementin, which breaks down blood clots. Describes text being conducted by doctors at the Essen Clinic in Germany on the use of leeches to relieve arthritis pain. Also tells about experiments at the Neuroscience Institute of at the State University of New York at Old Westbury on obtaining morphine from the leech’s salivary glands.