Plauge

Pharmacy is a profession in the move all over the world, and while there is a lot of unfinished business in pharmacy, a lot had been achieved. However, pharmacy in the developing world is still plauged by the forces that tie it to the ground and pin it to the old routine of counting pills and hope for the best. This commentary reports and analyzes a phenomenon that is sweeping the Arabic speaking Middle East and promises to liberate pharmacy through a pharmacy Arabic spring. Factors that could be contributing to the past, and current, apathy of the practice of pharmacy in the Arab world will be discussed, and signs of a closing-in change in the profession will be shared...

The concept of stereotaxy is essentially based on functional topography, which continuously evolved from the first observation by Hippocrates of a motor deficit contralateral to an hemispheric wound, to the characteristic example of Broca's speech area. The fate of a method depends on the need for it. When an outsider phenomenon, such as a pharmacological newcomer, occurred, which brought, at least for a given period, a satisfactory solution, the need for the method disappeared and sent it in oblivion. At the same time, the understanding that some pathologies, such as brain tumors, were not adequately taken care of by classical surgery and could eventually respond correctly to general treatments, such as chemotherapy or radiotherapy, induced the application of this forgotten, or near to be abandoned, method to a totally new field: this is what Talairach and his associates did when they introduced the stereotactic biopsy, at a time where movement disorders needed less surgery as levodopa had come and provided a very attractive treatment...