Medical Deontology in Islam

Abstract

Our knowledge of medical practice in medieval Islams is still scanty. It is mostly derived from normative sources, textbooks and deontological texts, which rather depict an ambitious ideal to be followed than the social reality of the average physician. Moreover, deontological regulations in Arabic medical literature are to a large degree shaped by traditional conceptions. The present article, which is based on three so-called mirrors for physicians dating from the 9th to the 12th century AD, attempts to give a provvisional outline of possible Greek sources beyond the well-known Hippocratic writings on medical ethics and deontology and a first assessment of topics which seem to be original with the Arabic authors.