[Hepatology: yesterday, today and (maybe) tomorrow].
Hepatology was born as a separate medical specialty around the fifties of the last century, its importance progressively grows because of the severity and high prevalence of the liver diseases. The net balance of 50 years of hepatology is definitely positive: prevention (e.g. the fall of post-transfusion HB and HC virus infections), diagnosis and better treatments have achieved better survival and quality of life in liver disease. However, deviations, errors and obsolescence of once highly credited judgements and treatments have occurred, as in any other area of medicine. This review looks back at the main pieces of the progress, and reports some previous errors and inappropriate treatments, speculating on their possible reasons.
Pagliaro
Luigi
L
Università, Palermo.
Gridelli
Bruno
B
Craxì
Antonio
A
D005234:Fatty Liver / Q000628:therapy; D005544:Forecasting; D005762:Gastroenterology / Q000266:history / Q000639:trends*; D019694:Hepatitis B, Chronic / Q000628:therapy; D019698:Hepatitis C, Chronic / Q000628:therapy; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D008103:Liver Cirrhosis / Q000628:therapy; D008107:Liver Diseases / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000401:mortality / Q000517:prevention & control / Q000628:therapy*; D016031:Liver Transplantation; D011788:Quality of Life; D015996:Survival Rate