Information about Ibn Al Nafis

Ala-al-din abu Al-Hassan Ali ibn Abi-Hazm al-Qarshi al-Dimashqi (Arabic: علاء الدين أبو الحسن عليّ بن أبي حزم القرشي الدمشقي ) known as Ibn al-Nafis (Arabic: ابن النفيس ), was an Arab Muslim physician who is mostly famous for being the first to accurately describe human blood circulation and pulmonary circulation.^[1]

He was born in 1213 in Damascus. He attended the Medical College Hospital (Bimaristan al-Noori) in Damascus. Apart from medicine, Ibn al-Nafis learned jurisprudence, literature and theology. He became an expert on the Shafi'i school of jurisprudence and an expert physician.

In 1236, Al-Nafis moved to Egypt. He worked at the Al-Nassri Hospital, and subsequently at the Al-Mansouri Hospital, where he became chief of physicians and the Sultan’s personal physician. When he died in 1288, he donated his house, library and clinic to the Mansuriya Hospital.

Writings

The most voluminous of his books is Al-Shamil fi al-Tibb, which was planned to be an encyclopedia comprising 300 volumes, but was not completed as a result of his death. The manuscript is available in Damascus.

His book on ophthalmology is largely an original contribution. His most famous book is Mujaz al-Qanun (The Summary of Law). Another famous book, embodying his original contribution, was on the effects of diet on health, entitled Kitab al-Mukhtar fi al-Aghdhiya.

He also wrote a number of commentaries on the topics of law and medicine. His commentaries include one on Hippocrates' book, and several volumes on Ibn Sina's Qanun Fil Tibb. Additionally, he wrote a commentary on Hunayn Ibn Ishaq's book.

Ibn al-Nafis also wrote a commentary on the last part of Avicenna's The Canon of Medicine concerning remedies, which was later translated into Latin by Andrea Alpago (d. 1522) and published in Europe in 1547. It is believed that Ibn al-Nafis' Commentary on the Anatomy of Canon of Avicenna, which first described pulmonary circulation, may have also also been translated into Latin and available in Europe around that time, and that it may have had an influence on the descriptions of pulmonary circulation given by Michael Servetus (d. 1553) and Realdo Colombo (d. 1559).^[2]

Discovery of pulmonary circulation

In 1924, an Egyptian physician, Dr. Muhyo Al-Deen Altawi, discovered a manuscript from 1242, titled Commentary on the Anatomy of Canon of Avicenna (a commentary on Avicenna's The Canon of Medicine), in the Prussian State Library in Berlin while studying the history of Arab Medicine at the medical faculty of Albert Ludwig’s University in Germany. This script is considered one of the best scientific books in which Al-Nafis covers in detail the topics of anatomy, pathology and physiology. This was the earliest description of pulmonary circulation.

The theory that was accepted, prior to Al-Nafis, was placed by Galen in the second century. Galen had theorized that the blood reaching the right side of the heart went through invisible pores in the cardiac septum, to the left side of the heart, where it mixed with air to create spirit, and was then distributed to the body. According to Galen's views, the venous system was quite separate from the arterial system, except when they came in contact through the unseen pores.

Based on his anatomical knowledge, Al-Nafis stated that:

"...the blood from the right chamber of the heart must arrive at the left chamber but there is no direct pathway between them. The thick septum of the heart is not perforated and does not have visible pores as some people thought or invisible pores as Galen thought. The blood from the right chamber must flow through the vena arteriosa (pulmonary artery) to the lungs, spread through its substances, be mingled there with air, pass through the arteria venosa (pulmonary vein) to reach the left chamber of the heart and there form the vital spirit..."

Elsewhere in his book, he said: ...

"The heart has only two ventricles ...and between these two there is absolutely no opening. Also dissection gives this lie to what they said, as the septum between these two cavities is much thicker than elsewhere. The benefit of this blood (that is in the right cavity) is to go up to the lungs, mix with what is in the lungs of air, then pass through the arteria venosa to the left cavity of the two cavities of the heart..."

In describing the anatomy of the lungs, Al-Nafis stated:

"The lungs are composed of parts, one of which is the bronchi; the second, the branches of the arteria venosa; and the third, the branches of the vena arteriosa, all of them connected by loose porous flesh."

He then added:

"... the need of the lungs for the vena arteriosa is to transport to it the blood that has been thinned and warmed in the heart, so that what seeps through the pores of the branches of this vessel into the alveoli of the lungs may mix with what there is of air therein and combine with it, the resultant composite becoming fit to be spirit, when this mixing takes place in the left cavity of the heart. The mixture is carried to the left cavity by the arteria venosa."

Al-Nafis also postulated that nutrients for heart are extracted from the coronary arteries:

"... again his (Avicenna's) statement that the blood that is in the right side is to nourish the heart is not true at all, for the nourishment to the heart is from the blood that goes through the vessels that permeate the body of the heart..."

See also

• Circulatory system
• Islamic medicine
• List of Arab scientists and scholars
• Medical Encyclopedia of Islam and Iran

Notes

References

• Bayon, H. P. (1941). Significance of the demonstration of the Harveyan circulation by experimental tests. Isis 33, 443-453.