Perception of Alzheimer Disease in Iranian Traditional Medicine

Perception of Alzheimer Disease in Iranian Traditional Medicine

Rostam Saifadini,1 Haleh Tajadini,2,* Rasool Choopani,2 Mitra Mehrabani,3 Mohamad Kamalinegad,4 and Aliakbar Haghdoost5

Iran Red Crescent Med J. 2016 Mar; 18(3): e22054.

Published online 2016 Mar 1. doi: 10.5812/ircmj.22054

PMCID: PMC4884442

Abstract

Context:

Alzheimer disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia. In regards to the world’s aging population, control and treatment of AD will be one of the major concerns of global public health in the next century. Alzheimer disease was not mentioned with the same phrase or its equivalent in traditional medical texts. The main of present paper was to investigate symptoms and causes of alzheimer disease from the view point of Iranian traditional medicine.

Evidence Acquisition:

In this qualitative study, we searched reliable sources of Iranian traditional medicine such as Canon of Medicide by Avicenna (Al-Quanon fi- tibb), Aghili cure by Aghili’s (Molajat-E-aghili), Tib-E-Akbari, Exire -E-Aazam and Sharh-E-Asbab and some reliable resources of neurology were probed base on keywords to find a disease that had the most overlap in terms of symptoms with alzheimer disease. By taking from the relevant materials, the extracted texts were compared and analyzed.

Results:

Findings showed that alzheimer disease has the most overlap with Nesyan (fisad-e-zekr, fisad-e-fekr and fisad-e-takhayol) symptoms in Iranian traditional medicine. Although this is not a perfect overlap and there are causes, including coldness and dryness of the brain or coldness and wetness that could also lead to alzheimer disease according to Iranian traditional medicine.

Conclusions:

According to Iranian traditional medicine, The brain dystemperement is considered the main causes of alzheimer disease. By correcting the brain dystemperement, alzheimer can be well managed. This study helps to suggest a better strategy for preventing and treating alzheimer in the future.

Keywords: Alzheimer Disease, Medicine, Traditional, Iran

3.1. Overview of the Iranian Traditional Medicine Perception of Alzheimer Disease

3.1.1. Definition and Types of Nesyan From the Perspective of Traditional Medicine

Nesyan means to forget things that the person has learned previously or is learning. Accordingly, Nesyan is of different types including fisadezekr, fisadefekr and fisadetakhayol. Although, all three types are memory disorder (afat-e-zehn) (12).

3.1.2. Fisad-e-zekr

Avicenna and most scholars discussed that Fisad-e-zekr is one of the types of Nesyan in which all senses are well and all things that the person hears and sees and all dreams are consistent with the external realities. But, the problem is that all heard or seen things are forgotten immediately (12-16).

3.1.3. Fisad-e-fekr

In Traditional book explained that all things the patient remembers are incorrect (fased) and in fact his/her thinking is confabulation. In this condition, the patient is not able to think about issues in a way that tells things that are not deserved telling and refuse to tell things that are not deserved abstinence. The patient asks things not deserved and is not able to do his/her intended work (12, 13, 15, 16).

3.1.4. Fisad-e-takhayol

In its mild condition, the patient has very little night dream and even he/she has some, cannot remember them. The patient is not able to remind things that he/she sees. In sever condition, there has no night dream and if has, cannot remember it at all. The patient forgets all things that he/she sees very soon in the case of their absence. For example, the patient immediately forgets whatever he/she has said or whatever has seen as soon as it becomes absent. In fisadetakhayol, the patient tells and does things that are not good and admirable and imagines things that have not external reality. For example, sees headless human or a face which is half horse and half human (12-16).