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Medical Geography in Avicenna’s Medicine
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M. Ghias *   , M. Sharghi , A. Taghdisi |
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Abstract: (14400 Views) |
Medical geography is a branch of human geography that is largely influenced by and dependent to the natural geography. This branch of geography identifies the effects of natural factors on human body. These factors include climate, severity and direction of wind, sunshine, natural radioactive radiations, altitude type, texture, and composition of the soil, vegetation and different living organisms, and quality and quantity of water.
Medical geography is in the context of geography i.e., it is always dependent on the earth and mainly addresses the geographical distribution, causes, and prevalence of the diseases that are in some ways influenced by environmental factors. In this science, three factors environment (with all its aspects), human, and disease are studied separately and in relation to each other. The responsibility of a medical geographer is discovery of the disease focal points, determination of disease distributions, identifying the geographical causes and factors that lead to development and spread of the diseases, and finally determination of the cause and effect relationship among geographical and disease causes and conditions. In the current paper, we have explained the ideas and beliefs of ancient physicians and some scientists of this branch of medicine such as Avicenna about the afore-mentioned items. |
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| Keywords: Medical geography, Avicenna medicine, Climate. |
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Memorial article: Review Article |
Subject:
Special
Received: 2011/06/22 | Accepted: 2011/12/7
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