describe islamic medicine

1. Islamic Medicine
Ridha Wahyutomo,MD, Clin.Microbiologist

2. What is Islamic Medicine ?
Islamic Medicine is defined as an
approach to Medical Care whose basic
paradigms, concepts, values and
procedures conform to or do not
contradict the Qur’an and Sunnah.
IT IS NOT specific medical procedures or
pharmacopeia of therapeutic agents
used in a particular place or a particular
time.
Islamic Medicine is universal, all-
embracing, flexible, and allows for
growth and development of various
methods of investigating and treating
diseases within the frame-work
described above.
The Islamic approach to medicine has
reintroduced the human element in medicine
without denying the benefits of modern medical
technology.
It is a process of conceptual transformation
called the Islamization of Medicine.
The end-result of the Islamization process WILL
NOT BE a medical system FOR MUSLIMS ONLY but
for the whole of humanity because Islam is a set
of universal and objective values.
Islamization is not theologizing, or localizing of
parochial medicine but is rather a rocess that
makes an objective, universal, value-based and
systematic scheme of excellence for all.
Prof Omar Hasan Kasule Sr. MB ChB (MUK), MPH (Harvard(, DrPH
(Harvard) Professor of Epidemiology and Islamic Medicine
Universiti Brunei

3. Why Do We Need Islamic Medicine?
Motivating Factors
An unacceptably high number of
patients are being treated for side
effects of modern therapeutic agents
Narrow specialization leads to lack of
a holistic approach to the patient
Physicians behave as a technician
and turn a blind eye to moral and
social issues that affect the health of
his patients
Secularized medicine has no
consistent set of ethics leading to
malpractice, fraud, and bias in
research
By denying a religious and moral
dimension, European medicine operates
in a presumed moral vacuum.
All this is the result of
1. Materialist Reductionism
 lack of tauhid or wholism.
1. Greed due to consumerism.
2. Fear of Death is manipulative.
3. Application of laws that govern the
mineral kingdom to man.
Hence: Muslims wish to practice
MEDICINE not MEDI-SIN
'Evidence-Based' Medicine: A Coin's Flip Worth of Certainty
… http://www.activistpost.com/2012/11/evidence-based-medicine-
coins-flip.html  90% of the peer-reviewed clinical research, the
holy grail of the conventional medical system, is exaggerated, or
worse, completely false?

4. Tauhid
The concept of tauhid motivates
looking at the patient, the disease, and
the environment a singularity or single
system in equilibrium and continuum
with the unseen.
Thus all factors involving (affecting) all
three elements are taken into
consideration while making medical
decisions.
Tauhid motivates the Physician to view
the patient as one organism rather
than a client with a conveniently
packaged combination of organs and
pathologies ripe for exploitation.
The patient has physical, social,
psychological, and spiritual dimensions
that must be considered in synthesis
with an integrated, holistic approach.
Balance = middle path = moderation
The principle of tauhid requires an overall
comprehensive ‘birds-eye’ view of the
patient’s disease, their physical
constitution, their environment (physical
& social), their mental capacity and
knowledge base, and their belief system.
The Western allopathic system pays lip
service to these realms by merely
recording on paper some of the pertinent
data, but takes little of initiative or action
to modify medical treatments accordingly.
Essentially, Western medicine and society,
in its pursuit of profit, has been reduced
to recipe makers and vendors whereby
technicians (the doctor) prescribe and
treat according ly without taking or
affording the time, resources or concern
for a more comprehensive approach.

5. The Muslim Doctor’s Responsibility is to PROTECT & ACTIVATE
the Purpose of Shari’ah in the realm of medical practice with regard to :
Physical Health
Spiritual Health
Progeny
Mental Health
Wealth
The Physician’s role is integral to these purposes
which are PREVENTATIVE as well as CURATIVE
Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) said that:
Hence also, the Muslim Physician’s responsibility is not to blindly follow the West (taqlid)
because WESTERN ALLOPATHIC MEDICINE IS NOT CURATIVE WHICH DENIES AL’QUR’AN
The West is destroying their people’s health, progeny, spirits and wealth by treating symptoms
in a non-wholistic, non-tauhidic / non-Islamic manner: a neo-Medical Norm
 this is the result of Secular Humanism which has lead to Scientific Reductionism.
Allah did not reveal any disease without also REVEALING ITS CURE.
HENCE, AS MUSLIM PHYSICIANS, OUR DUTY IS TO:
SEEK, FIND AND APPLY THESE REVEALED CURES.

6. ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE
“Islamic Medicine” is not a reaction-to or a complete rejection-of modern
Western Medicine.
Natural therapeutics such as nutritional supplements and indigenous, un-
processed foods or folk medicines, chiropractic, naturopathy, homeopathy,
acupuncture, Chinese and Auruvedic medicines, etc., are included here as
being encouraged by Islam -- BUT NOT AS ALTERNATIVES to allopathic drug therapy.
Why? Because the word ‘alternative’ implies that Western Medicine is not
Islamic, which is not entirely true at all.
Western medicine is, however, an incomplete system with many serious flaws,
not the least of which is top-heavy administration and their profit motifs
guided by an extremely corrupt Pharmaceutical industry. As you study
Western medicine you will come to realize it is more about DISEASE
MANAGEMENT rather than disease cure.
Islamic Medicine is about both cure and prevention in addition to well defined
moral & ethical values and guidelines. Hence, it is a balanced tauhidic
(wholistic) scientific approach to mankind’s illnesses.

7. Islamic Medicine is defined as a medical practice whose basic paradigms,
concepts, values and procedures conform to or do not contradict the Qur’an
and Sunnah.
It is not specific medical procedures or therapeutic agents used in a particular
place or a particular time.
Islamic Medicine is universal, all-embracing, flexible, and allows for growth
and development of various methods of investigating and treating diseases
within this frame-work.
ISLAMIZATION IS NOT THEOLOGIZING or sectarian-parochial medicine (Chinese,
Malay, Arab or MB Medicine or Education) but rather it is a process that
makes for overall universal excellence.
In other words, the epitaph (obituary) should read:
Dr. ‘so and so’was an excellent physician,
and by the way, he/she was a Muslim.
[a Muslim who became and died an excellent physician].

8. Effects of Christianity
• Sickness was a punishment from God
• Sick could be healed if prayed for forgiveness
• People prayed to saints for specific cures
• Nuns & monks prayed for sick & provided herbal
remedies from monastery gardens
• Monks copied out ancient medical texts in
scriptoriums
• Church supported work of Galen & didn’t want
people to challenge ancient texts

9. Effects of Islam
• Caring for sick was important to the faith, e.g.
Baghdad hospital (805 AD)
• Islamic culture valued learning
• Greek medical texts translated into Arab and
preserved
• Baghdad centre for learning
• Islamic doctors preserved and catalogued
knowledge of Galen, esp. Rhazes & Avicenna

10. Healthcare in the Ancient Arabic World

11. Ancient Healthcare Continued

12. Canon of Medicine
Avicenna pioneered the idea of
taking pulse from the wrist. He
reasoned that the wrist was
easily accessible and did not
stress the patient out by having
to expose his or her body.
Avicenna also created the idea
of intubation. Intubation is the
process of inserting a tube into
the trachea of a patient to
facilitate breathing. This
method is still used today.

13. Canon of Medicine
• In the Canon of Medicine Avicenna presents
many groundbreaking ideas.
• He discovered that many diseases had a
contagious nature. For example he proposed
that tuberculoses was contagious
• In order to combat the contagious nature of
tuberculosis and other diseases he proposed
the idea of quarantine to limit the spread of
the disease. Avicenna realized that
tuberculosis was spread through water and
food so he quarantined these resources too.
• He also introduced the world to
experimental medicine and clinical
trials.
• He proposed seven rules one must
follow when testing new drugs. These
seven rules laid down the foundation of
modern experimental pharmacology
methods.

14. Seven Rules of Testing Drugs
1) “The drug must be free from any extraneous accidental quality.”
2) "It must be used on a simple, not a composite, disease.”
3) "The drug must be tested with two contrary types of diseases,
because sometimes a drug cures one disease by Its essential
qualities and another by its accidental ones.”
4) "The quality of the drug must correspond to the strength of the
disease. For example, there are some drugs whose heat is less
than the coldness of certain diseases, so that they would have no
effect on them.”
5) "The time of action must be observed, so that essence and
accident are not confused.”
6) "The effect of the drug must be seen to occur constantly or in
many cases, for if this did not happen, it was an accidental effect.”
7) "The experimentation must be done with the human body, for
testing a drug on a lion or a horse might not prove anything about
its effect on man."

15. Treating Patients
• Muslims believed that
diseases could be sent by
God.
• Unlike Christians Muslims
believed in finding remedies
for disease rather than
relying on prayer.
• As a result Islamic medicine
was far more advanced than
medicine in the West.

16. Other points to Remember…
• Islam believed Hygiene was important for
health.
• Charity and caring for others encouraged.
• Hospitals set up for sick.
• Sick people even given money so they didn’t
have to rush back to work.

17. My Quote
Patria Es
Humanidad

18. • Thoracic surgery of little Muhammad
• Old jew lady and Rasulullah (PBUH)
• Omar ibn Khattab and a widow
• King Richard and Saladin Al Ayoubi
• etc

26. Because....
• Moslem doctors have:
– Qur’an and sunnah as their morality guidance
– Effort to do the best for their patients
– Update knowledge

27. I’m not the best but I will do better. And
good is not enough if better is possible