Tārīkh-i pizishkī i.e., Medical History

In today's world, health is not just not having a disease, but according to the World Health Organization, health means having a state of complete physical, mental, social and even spiritual well-being.

In traditional Iranian medicine, which is a valuable heritage of several thousand years of practical experience and scientific interaction with other medical schools in antiquity, these points have been well considered.

Iranian traditional medicine is a school whose main focus is on maintaining health, so much so that scholars and scientists of traditional Iranian medicine in the definition of medicine have considered the priority of maintaining health and well-being to restore health necessary. The treatments of this school are effective in some common diseases as well as some medical problems and usually the complications and injuries are less.

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Ectopic pregnancy is a usually defined as a pregnancy in which implantation occurs outside the endometrium cavity. From its indirect references by Abulcasis (936-1013) and until 19^th century the Ep was known as a universally fatal accident.

It has been studied by library research on reliable and available traditional books as an article. Also, it has been reviewed modern medicine articles that to sight Ectopic pregnancy from medical history point of view.

Obviously one of the strong columns in modern medicine is eastern medicine and about Ectopic pregnancy is too. So one of the first scientist who point and explain it was Alcasisi.

Introduction: Most of the ancient civilizations were familiar with Honey as a food and a remedy. Medicinal uses of Honey have been mentioned even in holy Quran and holy Bible. Scholars of Iranian Traditional Medicine (ITM) have used Honey in various forms according to their knowledge for treatment of different types of disease. The most common form of Honey mentioned in ITM references is Maul Asl. In this article we have tried to discuss the role of Maul Asl in ITM for management of respiratory conditions and compare them with findings in modern medicine.

Method: In this article which is a descriptive review, we searched the Noor software of traditional and Islamic library for keywords Maul Asl and ma-ul-gharaten. Major texts of ITM from 2^nd to 14^th century were used for this purpose. Ingredients, production methods and medicinal properties were collected. We also searched science direct,  google scholar, pubmed and scopus for new medical findings using keywords respiratory disease, asthma, cough, honey, Maul Asl, honeywater, hydromel and collected material regarding medicinal properties of Honey in respiratory problems.

Results: Maul Asl is an Arabic word known as Ab-e-angabin in Farsi, Melition in Roman and Ma-ul-gharaten in Greek. There are various ways to prepare Maul Asl in different books but all of them mention water and Honey as main ingredients which are mixed together and boiled using gentle fire until a certain amount is left. What is different in various references is the proportion of water and Honey and the herbs that were added to boost certain effects of Maul Asl. In addition to its general uses as tonic, polisher, coctive and chopper of balgham, Maul Asl can be specifically used for conditions like fever, stomach problems of cold nature, colic, kidney and lung problems. It has especial use in pneumonia, pleuritis, cough, dyspnea, hoarseness of voice and snoring.

Discussion & Conclusion: Although no clinical trial regarding the effect of Maul Asl on respiratory diseases was found, recent findings show the benefits of Honey in management of respiratory problems especially dyspnea, children’s cough and their sleep quality. Since Honey is the main ingredient of Maul Asl, findings regarding the effects of Honey in respiratory problems cannot be underestimated. Considering the therapeutic effects of Maul Asl mentioned in ITM literature, and recent studies that show the effects of Honey on nocturnal cough, allergy and its anti-bacterial properties, plus its safety in terms of side effect, we can conclude that Honey in the form of Maul Asl can be helpful in management of patients with respiratory disease; however we need more future investigations in this field. There are different formulations of simple or compound Maul Asl in ITM literature; based on the particular disease, physicians have added a range of medicinal herbs to give it the necessary property. We hope to witness future investigations focusing on these herbs and their effects on respiratory problems.

Introduction: Insomnia is a common sleep disorder that can affect the mood, alertness, memory, security and daily functioning. Currently, the most commonly used drugs in the treatment of insomnia are the benzodiazepines, whose incidence of adverse events, such as cognitive disorders, drug dependence and reversal of symptoms after discontinuation restricts their use. This necessitates the need for more efficient treatments. In Iranian traditional medicine, insomnia and its therapies are widely discussed. In this study, it is revised the effect of materia medica on insomnia in traditional medicine.

Method: This study is a library and literature review. The effective drugs in treating insomnia are searched in six reference books on pharmacology of traditional medicine, including The Canon of medicine, Alabnie an haghayegh al Advie, Reyaz al Advie, Tazkare Davood Antaki, Tohfat Al-momenin and Makhzan-al-advie. The study is performed in several stages (finding keywords, searching for resources, and preparation of lists, finding synonyms, classifying, summarizing and rating the results by scores).

Results: 28 materia medica were found to the treat insomnia, among which 25 cases had a plant origin and the rest were of animal origin. The results of this study are sorted in a table based on their score of effectiveness. The highest scores found to correspond to Lactuca sativa L., Viola odorata and Cucurbita moschata whose sedative and hypnotic effects have been shown in animal or human studies.

Discussion & Conclusion: The obtained results showed that materia medica can help to conduct future clinical trials to obtain new drugs which are effective in insomnia treatment.

Introduction: Today, medical students pass anatomy as the theoretical and practical courses and learn about the internal organs in autopsy halls from the first year of university, but in earlier times, despite the limitations of facilities and cultural rigor in autopsy, how many medical practitioners  knew about inside the body, especially about female genitalia? It was a main question that led us to conduct this research.

Method: This research is a descriptive review in more than 20 references of Iranian traditional medicine from 3rd to 13th centuries AD, which study the Anatomical descriptions of female internal genitalia in Iranian traditional medicine references and compare it with today's science. Also teaching method of Anatomy in traditional medicine is introduced briefly.

Results: According to this research, although traditional physicians often used animals for learning and training of anatomy due to cultural considerations, but some anatomical descriptions are so detailed that is showing the autopsy of the human body, even though secretly. For describing and teaching anatomy, parts of the body were likened to tangible things. Sizes were usually described with a phalange. Although the photographic equipment was not available, descriptions are tangible and understandable. Illustrated anatomical books can be seen from the eighth century AD onwards. Iranian traditional practitioners at least from the third century, and even before Avicenna, knew the external genitalia in addition to internal genitalia as well, they named various components of the female reproductive system and described its functions. Various parts of internal genitalia named the uterus (Rahem or Zehdan), fallopian tubes (Oieh e Rahemi), cervix (Fam e Rahem), vagina (Onog e Rahem) and ovaries (Onsa iayn, Beyzatein).The anatomical descriptions in Iranian traditional books are very similar to today's scientific findings.

Discussion & Conclusion: The traditional medicine practitioners had fairly accurate knowledge about female genitalia anatomy and were able to diagnose and treat many women's diseases which resulted detailed books about Gynecological diseases.

ICS (International continence society) has explained urinary incontinence as any loss of urine involuntarily. UI (urinary incontinence) is not a mortal condition but has many adverse effects on patients’ quality of life. Studies have shown a high prevalence of UI among women, especially in older ages and higher body mass index.

Due to intervention of UI with religious activities, demand for treatment of UI is more serious in our country. It is believed that all the kinds of drug therapy and surgeries have many side side effects especially in old patients. On the other hand it seems that Iranian Traditional Medicine can manage this disease as a hypothesis. So a plan was programmed as a first step to review philosopher’s approach to diseases specially UI.

Terms "salasolbol" and "bolfelferash" which mean loss of urine involuntarily and enuresis respectively, were considered equivalent for UI. Causes and treatments of these conditions were excluded and written in this review article. Based on ancient’s opinion, the most causes of UI is "cold" and "wet" of bladder and "esterkha" of external sphincter which make them be weak and lost their internal natural powers specially "maseke" which is bladder’s power for holding urine.

Signs and symptoms of patients who suffer from UI, even their laboratories studies on the basis of traditional medicine, confirm this idea. It seems new view from an old but original frame of traditional medicine to UI can introduce effective way for treating urinary incontinence.

Today drug addiction is a social, health and political problem in the most countries especially developing countries. Historical studies show that people are familiar with the drug, several thousand years before the birth of Christ returned. Hippocrates and Tyvfrast (at the time), used from opium to treat diarrhea and pain four hundred years before Christ. The ancient history of the "bang" is mentioned, but no evidence of an ancient Iranian acquaintance with opium is there. Razi and IbnSina were the first scientist that become familiar with the medicinal properties of opium in the treatment of diseases. Due to the use of opium in antiquity, philosophers and Iranian doctors found symptoms of opiate effects on the human body. Also they revealed the signs and symptoms who abandoned opium. In this study is reviewed Makhzan Aladvyh, Tohfeh Hakim moemen (Hakim Momin), Tashylalmanafe, Afyoniee (Afyvnyh) paper and Cited facilitate (Tashilal manafe). So it is described and compared the symptoms and the causes mentioned in the books of traditional medicine and modern medicine about the effect of opium and its withdrawal.

Introduction: In spite of weaker human olfactory than the other mammals, there is remarkable relationship with other organs such as reproductive system. Through accurate understanding of this relationship, interfering in olfactory system may be resulted in reproductive systems and vice versa. Understanding the connection between human olfactory and sexual & reproductive systems is the purpose of this study.

Method: This study is a descriptive and comparative semi systematic review of modern medicine and Iranian traditional medicine references.

Results: Both modern medicine and Iranian traditional medicine indicate odor impact on sexual desire (libido) and fertilization. Both in Iranian traditional medicine and modern medicine suggest that ability or inability to smell certain substances, probably associate with fertility dysfunction. Therapeutic using of scents and fragrances can be seen more in Iranian traditional medicine.

Discussion & Conclusion: Olfactory system affects Reproductive system in two ways: first, fertility will be more probability by increasing sexual desire (libido) and sexual behaviors and second, the olfactory system and the reproductive system have some common receptors. Inability to smell certain substances can be predicted fertility dysfunction. Therefore the concept of this study add the other researches are important because Often, diagnostic and therapeutic interventions in the olfactory system, are easier and less expensive than treatment of genital and reproductive system. By more accurate understanding of connections between these two systems, a new vision of fertility treatments will be achieved in Reproductive Medicine.

Introduction: Ileus is a common complication of abdominal surgery and it is non-preventable. It not only causes delays in patient recovery, but also significantly increases the cost of health care systems. Despite of the various studies, Pathophysiology and treatment of ileus is unknown. This study aimed to investigate the causes and treatment of post-operative ileus from the viewpoint of traditional medicine and classic medicine.

Method: In this review study was investigate the texts in the field of traditional medicine about ileus. Sampling was conducted by dependency and relationship to the subject with "light application". A thorough search with the key words "Ilavoos", "colic", "Sooemezaj", "Amaa", "colon" and "hefzossehe" was conducted in search of the text of traditional medicine, also in databases of classical medicine such as Pub med, Science Direct, Ovid by keywords "post-operative ileus", "bowel movement", "surgery" and "bowel function", single and combined. Data were analyzed following content analysis.

Results: Ileus in the books of traditional medicine were consider of Ilavoos And philosophers have considered it a severe colic. The cause of ileus in the context of traditional medicine is very cold mezaj of intestines that causes bloating and pain. As well as the other reason of ileus is anesthetics drugs that destroys the sense of disposal of intestine so the retained materials not pass.

Discussion & Conclusion: The literature review of modern medicine and traditional medicine showed that Ilavoos in traditional medicine is not full compliance with post-operative ileus, and it is necessary in this field to a theory. It seems that according to the conditions such as opening of the abdomen during surgery and local or general anesthesia that leads to coldness and numbness of the body during surgery caused cold sooemazaj Amaa that followed dysfunction of intestines or production of gas. Therefore, the use of drugs that cause warming of the gastrointestinal tract can be effective in this regard.