Avicenna’s Contribution to Contraception

Abstract

Throughout history, there have always been different opinions about the necessity and methods of contraception in different cultures. Persian medical scientists in the medieval era illustrated different contraceptive methods in their manuscripts. Avicenna, for example, discussed different types of contraceptive methods in Canon, one of the most important medical books written in the 10th century AD. In this paper, we describe the indications as well as two types of contraceptive methods derived from canon of Medicine: Physical & psychological methods and pharmacological Methods (Materia Medica). Reviewing such issues can not only present Avicenna's professional and scientic knowledge but also help researchers in modern medicine to conduct experiments to nd newer and more efcient prevention methods with fewer side effects.