What happened in Baghdad more than a thousand years ago.The concept and structure of what we know as a modern hospital is a creation of Islamic culture in the Golden Age.
11th century pharmacy of 860 doctors were reproved 160;However, a much more acceptable percentage than the results of any current income exam.But the controversy did not stop there.It is known that they began to circulate a kind of manuals, designed so that patients could evaluate the expertise of their doctors and avoid being cheated by dishonest and improvised.
In these circumstances, a wealthy transport entrepreneur, who challenged caravans to the entire Middle East market, wanted to test a doctor who had recommended him.He gave him a sample of urine, telling him that he belonged to his lover, who suffered from some disorders.The doctor immediately discovered the trap, as soon as he realized that the urine was donkey, and without flinching he prescribed the patient a strict alfalfa diet and grasses.With that he managed to approve the exam, became famous and was even hired by Caliph himself.
I forgot to say that all that happened in Baghdad more than a thousand years ago.
At that time, Arab doctors studied in Madrasas, those religious schools to which recent Islamic fundamentalism has given such a bad reputation.Not all were necessarily Arab or Muslims: it was common for them to be Hinduists, Jews and Christians among them.The medicine they practiced was also quite eclectic.
The doctors were recognized by their cape and their white robe, which were crowned by the turban that distinguished the profession.As in all times, there were some doctors who enriched themselves and others who led a life of service to the most needy.Some became famous for their successes and others for their failures.Among the great teachers, Rhazes was known for his austerity, but Avicena was a notorious womanizer and drinker.Both were tireless workers.
The most interesting thing is that everyone did their learning in hospitals, which were public and free.The concept and structure of what we know as a modern hospital is a creation of Islamic culture in the Golden Age, before Baghdad was razed by the Mongols and Córdoba fell into the reconquest of Spain.Everything else, modern science put it, which also owes something to the Arabs.
sanctuaries, hospices and hospitals
The closest thing to a hospital that the Greeks had in the classical period were the temples of Asklepios, the God of Medicine.There the serious or chronic patients attended in search of a miracle, to undergo therapies that were a mixture of healing by faith and empirical medicine.The Romans, whom everyone recognizes as great organizers, never took care of developing social medicine, and barely had campaign hospitals for their conquering troops.Only with Christianity the hospices appeared, destined for the poor who could not pay a doctor.The State did not deal with them, and were sustained with the donations of some philanthropists.The Emperor Julian complained that the hospices served for Christians to proselytize.
However, in Western Europe to the hospices they were scarce, at least until the thirteenth century, and the concept of hospital was born only after the Crusades.
Very different was the situation in the Byzantine Empire, where there were hospitals for the poor (the so -called hospital) that had a stable medical body.In the Byzantine world, the most outstanding doctors belonged to the Nestorian religion, a heresy of Christianity.When Emperor Zenón threw them from Syria, the Nestorians emigrated to Persia (Iran).There they were assimilated by the Arabs, which by the seventh century had alreadyConquered Syria, Persia and Egypt.
While Western Europe suffered the invasions, the empire dissolved and culture fell on barbarism, the Arabs carried out the appropriation of all Greek scientific knowledge, which had been preserved by Syrian culture.The Greek texts, which had been translated into Syriac, were expired again to Arabic.Centuries later, they returned to Europe after being retarded to Latin, which explains not a few misunderstandings, in science and in philosophy.
As regards medicine, the Transfer Center for Knowledge was the city of Jundi Shapur, in Persia.There was a great community of Persian, Indian, Christian, Nestorian, Zoroastrian, Jewish and Greek doctors, with libraries that had a considerable flow of knowledge, both of Greek origin and from India.
When this process concluded, the Abásida dynasty had made Baghdad its capital, and it was already possible to talk about Grecoislamic or Yunani medicine, which we call "Arabic."
The history written by Europeans has tended to relativize these decisive contributions, assigning to the Arabs the role of mere intermediaries, which would hardly have had the merit of preserving Greek science.In fact, the Arabs did not have much to copy, apart from the classics, because in Europe there was no empirical research, or study centers where to train professionals.
In the Islamic world, doctors enjoyed some autonomy to investigate and have hospitals to practice.They did not cease to have conflicts with the religious authorities, because the Qur'an spoke of resignation to pain, but also ordered the sick, which fostered medicine.
Hospitals were medical training centers, where therapeutics was based on "repeated experience."For their time, the Arabs were excellent chemicals, they were very advanced in optics and although they did not have the instruments that we considered elementary today in a laboratory, they had developed a true virtuosity for observation.They followed a strict methodology to examine the patient and their dejections.In particular, they gave much importance to the variations of the pulse.
One of the great Arab doctors, known by Europeans with the name of Rhazes, was an indefatigable worker who wrote more than 200 treaties.An experience that he did with meningitis patients is remembered.Beyond the wrong therapy, what makes it interesting is the method.Rhazes ordered a group of patients to be blew, but left another group under observation, as control.The experimental method was not far away ...
Avicena (980-1037), which was called by his contemporaries "The Prince of Physicians", was able to write both a canon to consult professionals and a medicine poem, for the dissemination between the cult of cult.
In the West, Arab doctors like Avicena and Averroes were better known and discussed as philosophers, but Geber was an authority for alchemists.The almost unknown Ibn An-Nafis was the one who discovered pulmonary circulation, four centuries before Servet, but that was just recognized in Europe less than a century ago.
public and free
The Arab Hospital (which had a Persian name, bimaristan) was not confessional.It was a secular institution, which attended everyone, were rich or poor, believers or incredulous.It was sustained thanks to the WAFQ, the inheritance and donations of properties that made the most wealthy to make eternal life, with as much generosity as they put today in creating foundations to evade taxes.
The first hospital that was founded was that of Damascus, in the year 706 of our chronology.It had several stable doctors and had special sectors where the lepers was isolated and attended to theBlind.
In the brightest stage in the history of Islam hospitals were founded in Cairo, Baghdad, Tunisia and Türkiye, and, of course, also in Granada and Córdoba.
The first of Baghdad's hospitals was founded by Harun Al-Rehy, the legendary Caliph of the thousand and one nights.He had 25 doctors, among which there were oculists, surgeons and chiropractics who made up the bones.The patients who admitted had to leave their clothes when they entered, and received clean clothes.They were bathed and moving with clothes frequently.
One of the hospitals in the city of Cairo had been founded by Saladino and was one of the few sustained by the treasury.Another, the Ahmed Ibn Tûlûn, had two therapeutic bathrooms, for men and women, a pavilion for the mentally ill, a consultation library and a medication dispensary, attended by several pharmacists.Abulcases, the Andalusian Arab who was a surgeon teacher, informs us that the women who practiced medicine "were scarce", but there was still some as gynecologists and obstetricians.
For the 10th century, the authorities had to provide medical care to prisoners.They also used to dispatch traveler dispensaries to serve patients from rural areas.
In the Syrian-Eggc Hospitals of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries there were several pavilions for the various specialties.They had their own source to provide water, pharmacy, library and kitchen.There was a body of nurses and practitioners.
At that time, the Byzantines had also begun to transfer their knowledge.This now worked in reverse, back to the West.They had such good hospitals as the Arabs.They were for the poor because, except emergencies, the rich were treated in their homes.For the thirteenth century, Constantinople had the SamSson Xenon hospital, with surgery and ophthalmology guards, and Pantokran Xenon, where there were five pavilions with 17 doctors, 34 nurses, 11 service employees and a pharmacy with 6 apothecaries.
To all this, in Western Europe there was nothing comparable.In the era of Charlemagne, which made diplomatic contacts with the Caliph Harun Al-Rashid, the Western Empire had just some hospice.
When the Crusaders, who in general were quite gross, met the efficient Arab hospitals, were so impressed that some of them created the order of the Knights of the Hospital of San Juan, later known as Malta's order.His Jerusalem hospital barely had four doctors and four surgeons (then they were different professions), but it was the one that gave name to all the hospitals that came later.
Back to Europe, the hospitals inspired the foundation of the Hospital of the Holy Spirit of Rome and the Hôtel-Dieu of Paris.Later, the Bourgeois of Florence, with Folco Portinari at the head, created the Hospital of Santa María Nuova that had a public assistance service for transfers and home care.It was called "mercy" and I know that I was still alive in the middle of the last century.
But all this happened only in the fifteenth century.The Arabs had had efficient hospitals five or six centuries before.They also had the habit of decorating them with Arabesques or with verses of the Qur'an, but also the good taste of not putting signs that said “Saladino driving”, “Harun al-Rarschid management” or “Damascus doing.”