Ibn Nafis and the early description of the role of coronary arteries in blood supply of the heart

Abstract

Ibn Nafis, a Syrian surgeon and physician was born in Al-Qarshnear Damascus in 1210 AD (Fig. 1). He studied medicine in his homelandunder supervision of Ibn-Essuri and then went to Cairo. Hefound al-Mansauri hospital and also became dean of the NaturalSchool of al-Salahi hospital, a position he held until he died in1288 AD. He wrote about twenty medical books during his scientificlife [1,2].In the mid-20th century when his book, “Sharh-e Tashrieh-e Qanun[Commentary on Anatomy of Canon]” was discovered in the archivesof the Prussian State Library in Berlin in 1924, he became famousbecause it was believed he was the originator of pulmonary circulation[3,4]. Although nowadayswe know hewas not the originator of this theoryand itwas presented by his predecessors like Akhawayni (?–983 AD)[5] and rooted in ancient Persian medicine [6], he had other noveltheories in cardiology which were unique in that time [7].Ibn Nafis doubt Avicenna's theories on blood supplying of the heartin his “Commentary on Anatomy of Canon” book. He wrote in thisbook: “His [Avicenna's] statement that the blood that is in the right sidenourishes the heart is not true at all, for nourishment of the heart is actuallyfrom the blood that goes through the vessels that permeate the body of theheart” [8]. It is the first reported document on the role of coronaryarteries in the history of cardiology.In medieval Persia, the paradigmofmedicinewas based on humoraltheory (a holistic paradigm). In this view, anatomy was not tooimportant and health and disease were belonging to balance andimbalance of four humors. Therefore, most of physicians like Avicenna(980–1032) did not attention to this field and mostly followed Galenand copied his anatomical parts including his mistakes (like threeventricle in heart, existing pores in the heart septum, etc) in theirbooks. Some others like Akhawayni and Haly Abbas (949–982 AD)accessed ancient Persian medical texts and therefore in some casesused their right theories (in contrast of false Greek theories) likeInternational Journal of Cardiology 204 (2016) 131–132⁎