TY - JOUR

T1 - Avicenna (980-1037 CE) and his Early Description and Classification of Dementia

AU - Taheri-Targhi, Somaiyeh

AU - Gjedde, Albert

AU - Araj-Khodaei, Mostafa

AU - Rikhtegar, Reza

AU - Parsian, Zahra

AU - Zarrintan, Sina

AU - Torbati, Mohammadali

AU - Vafaee, Manouchehr Seyedi

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2019 - IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved.

PY - 2019

Y1 - 2019

N2 - According to the World Health Organization (WHO), dementia is a disorder that occurs as result of a neurodegenerative process in brain, and usually is chronic or progressive by nature. Most descriptions of senile dementia date back to Alois Alzheimer. In 1906, Alzheimer described the first patient, Auguste Deter, who suffered from the disorder that later became known as Alzheimer's disease. Although, the history of the disease before 1906 is quite rich, little has been said about the contributions of ancient and medieval physicians to the understanding of dementia. Over the centuries, the concept of senile dementia changed from an inevitable mental decline with aging, to different sets of clinical features with narrow limits of diagnosis of a disease in its own right. Documentation of the historical origins of prevention, diagnosis, and therapies of dementia would make an important contribution to a more complete understanding of this pathological degeneration of dementia. The present review focuses on the contributions of Avicenna (AD 980-1037) to the development of diagnosis and the discovery of etiology of different forms of dementia, with the goal of revealing the extent to which dementia was understood in the golden age of Islam in Persia.

AB - According to the World Health Organization (WHO), dementia is a disorder that occurs as result of a neurodegenerative process in brain, and usually is chronic or progressive by nature. Most descriptions of senile dementia date back to Alois Alzheimer. In 1906, Alzheimer described the first patient, Auguste Deter, who suffered from the disorder that later became known as Alzheimer's disease. Although, the history of the disease before 1906 is quite rich, little has been said about the contributions of ancient and medieval physicians to the understanding of dementia. Over the centuries, the concept of senile dementia changed from an inevitable mental decline with aging, to different sets of clinical features with narrow limits of diagnosis of a disease in its own right. Documentation of the historical origins of prevention, diagnosis, and therapies of dementia would make an important contribution to a more complete understanding of this pathological degeneration of dementia. The present review focuses on the contributions of Avicenna (AD 980-1037) to the development of diagnosis and the discovery of etiology of different forms of dementia, with the goal of revealing the extent to which dementia was understood in the golden age of Islam in Persia.

KW - Alzheimer's disease

KW - Avicenna

KW - dementia

KW - history of medicine

KW - Persian medicine

U2 - 10.3233/JAD-190345

DO - 10.3233/JAD-190345

M3 - Review

C2 - 31524162

AN - SCOPUS:85073744088

VL - 71

SP - 1093

EP - 1098

JO - Journal of Alzheimer's Disease

JF - Journal of Alzheimer's Disease

SN - 1387-2877

IS - 4

ER -