Kapronczay Károly szerk.: Orvostörténeti közlemények 218-221. (Budapest, 2012)
KÖZLEMÉNYEK - Monos Emil—László Molnár—Lajos Szollár—Osmo Hänninen: Rácz Sámuel, az első magyar nyelven írott élettan-tankönyv írója
94 Comm. Je Hist. Artis Med. 218—221 (2012) textbooks in health-related sciences in Finnish. This book has also been translated into Swedish and more recently also into Estonian (Inimese fusiologia ja anatoomid) in 2001. The published national medical literature of the third independent Finno-Ugric nation, the Estonians, is much younger than that of Hungarians and Finns. The present development has, however, been fast. The first textbook on physiology was the Estonian Epler’s and his co-workers' translation of the textbook published by Schmidt and Thews about ten years ago (EPLER ET AL. 1997). The national literature of other Finno-Ugric nations is now in a new boom. One must, however, ask when the medical literature will reach appropriate priorities. These nations need medial specialists who also have the same enthusiasm as Samuel Rácz in Hungary and Elias Lönnrot in Finland had and who master their national language in addition to medicine. The importance of national language is easy to understand when we observe the transfer of Greek and Roman medical knowledge via Arabic. The Persian ibn Sina (AVICENNA 1956) (980-1037) was one of the key persons in this process. It is interesting to learn that in this case transfer took place in the form of poetry before book printing was invented (AVICENNA EDITION 1956). The Finnish national health heritage was transferred similarly, as for example Lönnrot’s Kalevala (reprinted e.g.1999) demonstrates. One should also remember that the Old Testament of Bible was originally poetry. The Koran is also wisdom in poetic form. To conclude: Finno-Ugric nations have so different languages from the majority of European Indo-European languages that it would be fair to have also medical terminology collected and published in their own peoples' languages to help the promotion of health and also treating diseases in the same way as it happened in Hungary and in Finland. Perhaps enthusiastic and devoted authors can be found among those persons who have studied medicine in Estonia, Finland or in Hungary. Perhaps the Medical Associations of these countries can help in publishing those books as they have already supported the publication of other literature in those languages. Correspondent: EMIL MONOS, Prof.MD, DSc. Director Institute of Clinical Experimental Research and Human Physiology Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary monos. emil@ med.semmelweis-univ.hu
