The are four main Time Periods to know about:

Middle Ages 1000 - 1450
Renaissance 1450 - 1750
Industrial Revolution 1750 - 1900
20th Century On 1900 - present

The are are also seven Areas of Medicine. It's easy to remember these using the acronym PET HATS:

Public Health - how the government keeps the people healthy.
Explanations of disease - what people believed caused and cured disease.
Treatments - herbal remedies, superstitions and modern medicine.

Hospitals - where people could go if they were sick.
Anatomy - how the body fits together.
Training - who tried to cure people and how were they trained?
Surgery - cutting into the body to try to fix it.

When revising, always focus on a key question. First take one Time Period and try to describe the key features of each Area of Medicine. Then compare that time period with the previous one - can you identify what stayed the same and what changed? Which were the most significant turning points? Gradual change (e.g. in training of doctors) is the hardest to describe so look for key reference points (e.g. by 1700 astrology was no longer used as an explanation for disease). It is helpful to take one Area of Medicine and study that across time periods.

The third part of the course is to explain why change did or didn't happen. Most change and continuity can be explained using two or three of the following Factors:

War
Individual Genius - try to explain what qualities the person showed.
Government
Religion
Technology
Science
Money
Chance
Research Teams
Trade

GCSE Health and the People AQA

Introduction