The real and true rational medicine is attributed to Hippocrates (ca. 460-377 B.C.) , so he is known as the father of medicine.

Hippocrates was born on the island of Kos, in the Dodecanese, where he developed the rational school with which a great many of the ideas attributed to Hippocrates are associated. He lived in the 50 years of ericlean peace, a period in which philosophy flourished, and travelled e!tensively in the "editerranean area. #e know that his $ourneys took him, inter alia, to mainland %reece, &icily, 'le!andria, (yrine, and (yprus. )undamentally, the basis of rational medicine is a negation of divine intervention in the disease. *ven the famous sacred illness, epilepsy, was attributed to a dysfunction of the organism. Hippocrates also made humours correspond with the seasons+ the first season, that of blood and air corresponded to spring, the summer was fire, bile and liver, autumn was earth, black bile and spleen, while winter was the season of water, of phlegm -mucus. and of the brain. /n addition, a parallel was drawn between the four seasons of life, infancy and early youth, then mature youth, followed by virile advanced years, and, ultimately, senility. 0eferring back to what 'lcmaeon of (rotone had said, Hippocrates maintained that disease was caused by a dise1uilibrium, no longer speaking of democracy or monarchy so as not to offend the tyrants, and that where there was e1uilibrium between the humours there was health. (ures lay in removing the humour that was in e!cess. His theory also e!plained the various temperaments+ a coleric sub$ect had too much bile, a phlegmatic one too much mucus, and so on. The most important element at the centre of Hippocrates2 conception was not the disease, which he e!plained in a holistic manner, but man. (ompared to the rival (nidus2s school, which focussed on a reductionist conception of disease much as occurs today, Hippocrates2 conception made his school2s fortune, his school prevailed as it concentrated on the man, while that of (nidus concentrated on the disease and, because it did not have the necessary evidence to carry out its ideas, it ceased to e!ist, whereas that of Hippocrates remained active. 3nderlying Hippocrates2 conceptions was a profound and practical philosophy based notably on common sense. The fundamental principles were simply to leave things to nature, that is to say, to the healing powers of nature, and to observe the illness very carefully, intervening as little as possible, and paying attention to nutrition and to the wholesomeness and healthiness of the air. /n order to eliminate the dise1uilibrium, the e!cess material -the so4called materia peccans. had to be removed. "eans available to dispose of materia peccans were 2headpurges2 -5 purges of the head. which consisted of inducing snee6ing with drugs such as pepper, and enema -clyster., or otherwise by blood4letting. The latter was not much used by Hippocrates2 followers, but in the 0oman *poch, and especially in the "iddle 'ges, it became a very common procedure with grave conse1uences for patients who, in some cases were bled to death. /t must be noted, however, that, Hippocrates recommended that physicians employ all medical treatments with the ma!imum of frugality. Hippocrates te!ts, or those believed to be such, were taught in the universities until 7800. These te!ts were composed of a series of aphorisms, amongst which is the famous 9:ife is brief, art is long, opportunity is fleeting, e!perience is fallacious, $udgment is difficult9, these form the basis of his philosophy and lead to careful, repetitious thought before a medical intervention. Hippocrates thus created a holistic medicine based on the man or microcosm, preaching the use of the available therapies with the ma!imum of conservation. 0emedies were few because at that

time pharmacology did not e!ist and the first hint of herbal medicine did not arrive until about a century later, from one of 'ristotle2s students called Theophrastus. Hippocrates is also remembered because he e!pressed the first concepts of medical ethics, which still apply today, and in fact are contained in the Hippocratic oath, effectively encoding the person of the doctor.

HIPPOCRATES Fat er o! "e#ici$e

"edical historians generally look to Hippocrates as the founder of medicine as a rational science. /t was Hippocrates who finally freed medicine fromthe shackles of magic, superstition, and the supernatural.

Hippocrates collected data and conducted e!periments to show that disease was a natural process, that the signs and symptoms of a disease were caused by the natural reactions of the body to the disease process, and that the chief role of the physician was to aid the natural resistance of the body to overcome the metabolic imbalance and restore health and harmony to the organism. Hippocrates was born on the island of (os, off the southwest coast of 'sia "inor, or present4 day Turkey, around ;<0 =.(. His father was a physician4priest in the 'sclepion at (os, and his family could trace its lineage back to the legendary 'sclepius. Hippocrates lived a very long life and died at a ripe old age in the town of :arissa in Thessaly.

T e Hippocratic Re%o&'tio$
#hen Hippocrates began to practicemedicine, the established school of medicine was the C$i#ia$ sc oo&. =ut this school2s approach to medicine had several serious flaws, whichwere already becoming apparent and starting to cause a general dissatisfaction with the art of medicine.

The (nidian school considered the body to be merely a collection of isolated parts, and saw diseases manifesting in a particular organ or body part as affecting that part only, which alone was treated. Their system of diagnosis was also faulty, relying e!clusively on the sub$ective symptoms related by the patient, while totally ignoring the ob$ective signs of the disease. Hippocrates radically disagreed with the (nidian school, countering that the human body functioned as one unified organism, or physis, and must be treated, in health and disease, as one coherent, integrated whole. /n diagnosis, not only the patient2s sub$ective symptoms, but the ob$ective signs of the disease must also be considered to arrive at an accurate assessment of what was going on. 's his main unifying theory for the holistic understanding of the human organism and how it functions in health and disease, Hippocrates used the concept of the Fo'r H'(ors. 'lthough the groundwork of humoral physiology and pathology had already been laid by his predecessors, Hippocrates finally brought the thory of the )our Humors into its classical form. Health is a harmonious balance of the )our Humors. Disease results from their disharmony and imbalance. The physician2s $ob is to restore health by correcting the imbalance and restoring harmony to the humors. To 1uote Hippocrates+ "The body of man has in itself blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile; these make up the nature of the body, and through these he feels pain or enjoys health. Now, he enjoys the most perfect health when these elements are duly proportioned to one another in respect to compounding, power and bulk, and when they are perfectly mingled. Pain is felt when one of these elements is in defect or excess, or is isolated in the body without being compounded with all the others." 4 The >ature of "an Hippocrates took his band of renegade physicians with him to the island of (os. There, they set about to revolutioni6e the art of medicine and put its theory and practice on a truer, sounder footing.

Hippocratic "e#ici$e
hysiology and pathology in Hippocratic medicine was based on the )our Humors. ' united confluence and sympathy between all four humors working together was necessary for good health. Pneuma the =reath or ?ital )orce, and the /nnate Heat, which were suffused into the blood from the lungs via the heart, gave the blood the power to sustain life. Hippocrates saw pepsis, or an orderly, balanced, harmonious digestion and metabolism of the )our Humors as being essential to all good health. /n disorders of pepsis Hippocrates saw the origin of most disease. Hippocrates2 anatomical knowledge was rather scant, but this is compensated for by his profound insights into human physiology and the soundness of his reasoning. =ut even so, his surgical techni1ues for dislocations of the hip and $aw were unsurpassed until the nineteenth century. /n therapeutics, Hippocrates saw the physician as the servant and facilitator of >ature. 'll medical treatment was aimed at enabling the natural resistance of the organism to prevail and overcome the disease, to bring about recovery.

/n the treatments he prescribed, Hippocrates was very sensible, pragmatic and fle!ible in his approach, favoring conservatism and moderation over radical or e!treme measures. =loodletting, which was much abused at other times in medicine2s history, was used only rarely by Hippocrates, and even then, only applied conservatively. Hippocrates placed great emphasis on strengthening and building up the body2s inherent resistance to disease. )or this, he prescribed diet, gymnastics, e!ercise, massage, hydrotherapy and sea bathing. Hippocrates was a great believer in dietary measures in the treatment of disease. He prescribed a very slender, light diet during the crisis stage of an acute illness, and a li1uid diet during the treatment of fevers and wounds. Hippocratic medicine was constitutionally based, so its approach to diagnosis and treatment was 1uite fle!ible. 's a holistic healing system, Hippocratic medicine treated the patient, and not $ust the disease. Hippocrates was the first physician to systematically classify diseases based on points of similarity and contrast between them. He virtually originated the disciplines of etiology and pathology. =y systematically classifying diseases, Hippocrates placed their diagnosis and treatment on a sounder footing.

T e Hippocratic Corp's
The Hippocratic (orpus is a collection of over <0 works. 'lthough all of them are attributed to Hippocrates, the (orpus is of a heterogenous character, and many, if not most, of its works may actually have been written by his students. &till, we can be fairly certain that Hippocrates actually did author many books in the (orpus, including many original, groundbreaking works. These include+ 'irs, #aters and laces 4 the first ma$or work on medical meteorology, climatology, geography and anthropology. 'phorisms 4 a collection of wise, pithy sayings giving advice on practical matters of diet, prognosis and therapeutics. 'ncient "edicine 4 a defense of the empirical study of medicine against one biased by preliminary a!ioms and assumptions. 'lso deals with the )our Humors.

T e )e*ac+ o! Hippocrates
Hippocrates was the personification of the ideal physician 4 wise, caring, compassionate and honest. He is most remembered today for his famous @ath, which set high ethical standards for the practice of medicine. His e!emplary life has been a constant and enduring source of inspiration for doctors and healers down through the ages.