[Ancient urology in Galicia (Spain)].
BACKGROUND
Although Urology is a recent branch of medical science and practice, it is not a contradiction to talk about ancient Urology, as a reflection on the ways of getting sick and treating genitourinary diseases in past times, sufferings that are recognized if compared to the present-day ones. This paper takes into account the social view of the history of medicine and tries to reject either the intention to create a mythic past for urology or to underestimate the ancient practices because of irrational or not scientific. MATERIAL Y METHOD: Review based on primary and secondary sources, with reference to the medicine and surgery of the urinary tract and genitalia in Galicia (Spain) and the Iberian peninsula, from the ancient and medieval periods, to the appearance of modern, anatomo-clinic medicine in the XVIIIth century.


RESULTS
Because of the pilgrimage through the Way of Saint James to Santiago de Compostela, many centers of great importance for the attention of sick people rose up in Galicia, like the Monastery of Saint Martin Pinario and the Hospital of the Catholic Kings, where traditional European standars of patient care and use of medicinal plants were followed in. Ancient medicine and surgery of the urinary tract and genitalia had in Galicia, characters of great interest, such as doctor Romano, instructor of Galician practitioners in catheterisation and urethral dilatation, and important thinkers such as the physician- philosopher Francisco Sanchez and the erudite monks Sarmiento and Feijoo, whom, without being doctors, may be considered as pioneers of modern evidenced-based medicine.


CONCLUSIONS
The importance that the Galician hospitals had in past times and the works of several characters related to Galician country, had a distinguished place in the ancient history of the medicine and surgery of the urinary tract and genitalia.
Fariña Pérez
L A
LA
D049668:History, 15th Century; D049669:History, 16th Century; D049670:History, 17th Century; D049671:History, 18th Century; D049690:History, Ancient; D049691:History, Medieval; D006801:Humans; D013030:Spain; D014572:Urology / Q000266:history*