A 900-Year-Old Document Records the Occurrence of Urinary Bilharziasis in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Arab MedicineA 900-Year-Old Document Records the Occurrence of Urinary Bilharziasis in Saudi Arabia Fereydoun Arfaa, MD Ezzat Mahboubi, and MD M. Zuheir Al-KawiMD Fereydoun Arfaa From the Bilharziasis Control Project, Ministry of Health, King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre, Riyadh Search for more papers by this author , Ezzat Mahboubi Address reprint requests and correspondence to Dr. Mahboubi: Department of Biological and Medical Research, King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre, P.O. Box 3354, Riyadh 11211, Saudi Arabia. From the Department of Biological and Medical Research, King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre, Riyadh Search for more papers by this author , and M. Zuheir Al-Kawi From the Department of Medicine, King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre, Riyadh Search for more papers by this author Published Online:24 Apr 2019https://doi.org/10.5144/0256-4947.1988.218SectionsPDF ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload citationTrack citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmail AboutABSTRACTABSTRACTWadi Al-Aghigh passes into a pond located in a cleft between two mountains. The wadi digs through the narrow passage in the mountain, which is named Suqf. The water flows into a pond called Rowwawa, described in poetry. The pond is never empty, so its bed has never been seen. The water then flows into the Tuffyatain pond, which has one of the freshest drinking waters, were it not for its causing bloody urine. The wadi continues to Al-Athabah, where there is another pond called Al-Athabah, after which the land was named. In this land there is property owned by Abbad bin Hamzah bin Abdullah bin Al-Zubair, which is rich in date trees. Beyond that is Rabigh, a cleft in the Suqf mountain, where the water of Al-Aghigh collects.IntroductionWhile collecting data to illustrate the progress achieved in the control of both urinary and intestinal schistosomiasis in recent years in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, we found a document that clearly indicates the occurrence of human infection with Schistosoma haematobium in parts of Medina in the 11th century ad. This document was written by Abi Obeid Abdullah ben Abdulaziz Al-Bekri Al-Andolossi, a well-known geographer. He died in the year 487 Hejira, which corresponds to 1094 ad. The title of the book is Mojam ma estaajam men asma elbilad walmawadea, which means "directory of names of countries and places" or "geographical directory." This book was reprinted in 1949 by Mustafa Al-Sagha, a professor at the Fouad I University in Cairo, Egypt.Abi Obeid describes a deep pond called Rowwawa in Wadi Aghigh around Medina; the water is sweet, but drinking it causes hematuria.It is interesting to note that even today we have found the snail-intermediate hosts of S. haematobium (Bulinus beccarri and B. wrighti) in some snail habitats in Wadi Aghigh, north of Makkah, which is a continuation of the same wadi in Medina.This interesting reference is not only the earliest documentation of urinary bilharziasis in the Arabian Peninsula, but also indicates that the association between the pond water and hematuria was common knowledge 900 years ago. Previous article Next article FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Volume 8, Issue 3May 1988 Metrics History Accepted18 August 1987Published online24 April 2019 InformationCopyright © 1988, Annals of Saudi MedicinePDF download